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1918 


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Delicious    Vice 

BY 
YOUNG  E.  ALLISON 


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THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 


Delicious  Vice 


Pipe  Dreams  and  Fond  Adventures 
of  an  Habitual  Novel-Reader  Among 
Some  Great  Books  and  Their  People 


BY 

YOUNG  E.  ALLISON 


Second  Edition 

(Revised  and  containing  new  material) 


CHICAGO 

THE  PRAIRIELAND  PUBLISHING  CO. 

1918 


Printed  originally  in  the  Louisville  Courier- Journal. 
Reprinted  by  courtesy. 


First  edition,  Cleveland,  Burrows  Bros.,  1907. 


Copyright  1907-1918 


Tobj  BuboTiU  PrinUr  And  Binder  Chio«e« 


A   RHAPSODY   ON   THE    NOBLE   PROFESSION 
OF    NOVEL    READING 

TT  must  have  been  at  about  the  good-bye  age  of 
forty  that  Thomas  Moore,  that  choleric  and  pomp- 
ous yet  genial  little  Irish  gentleman,  turned  a  sigh  into 
good  marketable  "copy"  for  Grub  Street  and  with 
shrewd  economy  got  two  full  pecuniary  bites  out  of 
one  melancholy  apple  of  reflection: 

"Kind  friends  around  me  fall 
Like  leaves  in  wintry  weather," 
— he  sang  of  his  own  dead  heart  in  the  stilly  night. 

"Thus  kindly  I  scatter  thy  leaves  on  the  bed 
Where  thy  mates  of  the  garden  lie  scentless  and 
dead." 
— he  sang  to  the  dying  rose.  In  the  red  month  of 
October  the  rose  is  forty  years  old,  as  roses  go.  How 
small  the  world  has  grown  to  a  man  of  forty,  if  he  has 
put  his  eyes,  his  ears  and  his  brain  to  the  uses  for 
which  they  are  adapted.  And  as  for  time — why,  it 
is  no  longer  than  a  kite  string.  At  about  the  age  of 
forty  everything  that  can  happen  to  a  man,  death 
excepted,  has  happened;  happiness  has  gone  to  the 
devil  or  is  a  mere  habit;  the  blessing  of  poverty  has 
been  permanently  secured  or  you  are  exhausted  with 
the  cares  of  wealth;  you  can  see  around  the  comer  or 
you  do  not  care  to  see  around  it;  in  a  word — that  is, 
considering  mental  existence — the  bell  has  rung  on 
you  and  you  are  up  against  a  steady  grind  for  the 
remainder  of  your  life. 


THE     DELICIOUS    VICE 


It  is  then  there  comes  to  the  habitual  novel  reader 
the  inevitable  day  when,  in  anguish  of  heart,  looking 
back  over  his  life,  he — wishes  he  hadn't;  then  he  asks 
himself  the  bitter  question  if  there  are  not  things  he 
has  done  that  he  wishes  he  hadn't.  Melancholy 
marks  him  for  its  own.  He  sits  in  his  room  some  win- 
ter evening,  the  lamp  swarming  shadowy  seductions, 
the  grate  glowing  with  siren  invitation,  the  cigar  box 
within  easy  reach  for  that  moment  when  the  pending 
sacrifice  between  his  teeth  shall  be  burned  out;  his 
feet  upon  the  familiar  corner  of  the  mantel  at  that 
automatically  calculated  altitude  which  permits  the 
weight  of  the  upper  part  of  the  body  to  fall  exactly 
upon  the  second  joint  from  the  lower  end  of  the  verte- 
bral column  as  it  rests  in  the  comfortable  depression 
created  by  continuous  wear  in  the  cushion  of  that 
particular  chair  to  which  every  honest  man  who  has 
acquired  the  library  vice  sooner  or  later  gets  attached 
with  a  love  no  misfortune  can  destroy.  As  he  sits 
thus,  having  closed  the  lids  of,  say,  some  old  favorite 
of  his  youth,  he  will  inevitably  ask  himself  if  it  would 
not  have  been  better  for  him  if  he  hadn't.  And  the 
question  once  asked  must  be  answered;  and  it  will  be 
an  honest  answer,  too.  For  no  scoundrel  was  ever 
addicted  to  the  delicious  vice  of  novel-reading.  It  is 
too  tame  for  him.     "There  is  no  money  in  it." 


And  every  habitual  novel-reader  will  answer  that 
question  he  has  asked  himself,  after  a  sigh.  A  sigh 
that  will  echo  from  the  tropic  deserted  island  of  Juan 
Fernandez  to  that  utmost  ice-bound  point  of  Siberia 
where  by  chance  or  destiny  the  seven  nails  in  the  sole 
of  a  certain  mysterious  person's  shoe,  in  the  month  of 
October,  1831,  formed  a  cross — thus: 
6 


A     RHAPSODY 


while  on  the  American  promontory  opposite,  "a  young 
and  handsome  woman  replied  to  the  man's  despairing 
gesture  by  silently  pointing  to  heaven."  The  Wander- 
ing Jew  may  be  gone,  but  the  theater  of  that  appalling 
prologue  still  exists  unchanged.  That  sigh  will  pene- 
trate the  gloomy  cell  of  the  Abbe  Faria,  the  frightful 
dungeons  of  the  Inquisition,  the  gilded  halls  of  Vanity 
Fair,  the  deep  forests  of  Brahmin  and  fakir,  the  joust- 
ing list,  the  audience  halls  and  the  petits  cabinets  of 
kings  of  France,  sound  over  the  trackless  and  storm- 
beaten  ocean — will  echo,  in  short,  wherever  warm 
blood  has  jumped  in  the  veins  of  honest  men  and 
wherever  vice  has  sooner  or  later  been  stretched  grovel- 
ing in  the  dust  at  the  feet  of  triumphant  virtue. 

And  so,  sighing  to  the  uttermost  ends  of  the  earth, 
the  old  novel-reader  will  confess  that  he  wishes  he 
hadn't.  Had  not  read  all  those  novels  that  troop 
through  his  memory.  Because,  if  he  hadn't — and  it 
is  the  impossibility  of  the  alternative  that  chills  his 
soul  with  the  despair  of  cruel  realization  —  if  he  hadn't, 
you  see,  he  could  begin  at  the  very  first,  right  then  and 
there,  and  read  the  whole  blessed  business  through 
for  the  first  time.  For  the  FIRST  TIME,  mark  you! 
Is  there  anywhere  in  this  great  round  world  a  novel 
reader  of  true  genius  who  would  not  do  that  with  the 
joy  of  a  child  and  the  thankfulness  of  a  sage? 

Such  a  dream  would  be  the  foundation  of  the  story 
of  a  really  noble  Dr.  Faustus.  How  contemptible  is 
the  man  who,  having  staked  his  life  freely  upon  a 
career,  whines  at  the  close  and  begs  for  another  chance; 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 


just  one  more — and  a  different  career!  It  is  no  more 
than  Mr.  Jack  Hamlin,  a  friend  from  Calaveras  County, 
California,  would  call  "the  baby  act,"  or  his  compeer, 
Mr.  John  Oakhurst,  would  denominate  "a  squeal." 
How  glorious,  on  the  other  hand,  is  the  man  who  has 
spent  his  life  in  his  own  way,  and,  at  its  eventide,  waves 
his  hand  to  the  sinking  sun  and  cries  out:  "Goodbye; 
but  if  I  could  do  so,  I  should  be  glad  to  go  over  it  all 
again  with  you — ^just  as  it  was!"  If  honesty  is  rated 
in  heaven  as  we  have  been  taught  to  believe,  depend 
upon  it  the  novel-reader  who  sighs  to  eat  the  apple  he 
has  just  devoured,  will  have  no  trouble  hereafter. 

What  a  great  flutter  was  created  a  few  years  ago 
when  a  blind  multi-millionaire  of  New  York  offered 
to  pay  a  million  dollars  in  cash  to  any  scientist,  savant 
or  surgeon  in  the  world  who  would  restore  his  sight. 
Of  course  he  would !  It  was  no  price  at  all  to  offer  for 
the  service — considering  the  millions  remaining.  It 
was  no  more  to  him  than  it  would  be  to  me  to  offer  ten 
dollars  for  a  peep  at  Paradise.  Poor  as  I  am  I  will 
give  any  man  in  the  world  one  hundred  dollars  in  cash 
who  will  enable  me  to  remove  every  trace  of  memory 
of  M.  Alexandre  Dumas'  "Three  Guardsmen,"  so  that 
I  may  open  that  glorious  book  with  the  virgin  capacity 
of  youth  to  enjoy  its  full  delight.  More;  I  will  dupli- 
cate the  same  offer  for  any  one  or  all  of  the  following: 

"Les  Miserables,"  of  M.  Hugo. 

"Don  Quixote,"  of  Senor  Cervantes. 

"Vanity  Fair,"  of  Mr.  Thackeray. 

"David  Copperfield,"  of  Mr.  Dickens. 

"The  Cloister  and  the  Hearth,"  of  Mr.  Reade. 
And   if  my  good  friend,  Isaac  of  York,  is  lending 
money  at  the  old  stand  and  will  take  pianos,  pictures, 
furniture,    dress    suits   and   plain   household    plate    as 


A     RHAPSODY 

collateral,   upon   even   moderate   valuation,    I    will    go 
fifty  dollars  each  upon  the  following: 

"The  Count  of  Monte  Cristo,"  of  M.  Dumas. 

"The  Wandering  Jew,"  of  M.  Sue. 

"The  Memoirs  of  Barry  Lyndon,  Esq.,"  of   Mr. 
Thackeray. 

"Treasure  Island,"  of  Mr.  Robbie  Stevenson. 

"The  Vicar  of  Wakefield,"  of  Mr.  Goldsmith. 

"Pere  Goriot,"  of  M.  de  Balzac. 

"Ivanhoe,"  of  Baronet  Scott. 
(Any  one  previously  unnamed  of  the  whole  layout 
of  M.  Dumas,  excepting  only  a  paretic  volume  entitled 
"The  Conspirators.") 

Now,  the  man  who  can  do  the  trick  for  one  novel 
can  do  it  for  all — and  there's  a  thousand  dollars  waiting 
to  be  earned,  and  a  blessing  also.  It's  a  bald  "bluff," 
of  course,  because  it  can't  be  done  as  we  all  know. 
I  might  offer  a  million  with  safety.  If  it  ever  could 
have  been  done  the  noble  intellectual  aristocracy  of 
novel-readers  would  have  been  reduced  to  a  condition 
of  penury  and  distress  centuries  ago. 

For,  who  can  put  fetters  upon  even  the  smallest 
second  of  eternity?  Who  can  repeat  a  joy  or  duplicate 
a  sweet  sorrow?  Who  has  ever  had  more  than  one 
first  sweetheart,  or  more  than  one  first  kiss  under  the 
honeysuckle?  Or  has  ever  seen  his  name  in  print  for 
the  first  time,  ever  again?  Is  it  any  wonder  that  all 
these  inexplicable  longings,  these  hopeless  hopes,  were 
summed  up  in  the  heart-cry  of  Faust — 

"Stay,  yet  awhile,  O  moment  of  beauty." 


Yet,  I  maintain.  Dr.  Faustus  was  a  weak  creature. 
He  begged  to  be  given  another  and  wholly  different 
chance  to  linger  with  beauty.     How  much  nobler  the 


THE    DELICIOUS    VICE 


magnificent  courage  of  the  veteran  novel-reader,  who, 
in  the  old  age  of  his  service,  asks  only  that  he  may  be 
permitted  to  do  again  all  that  he  has  done,  blindly, 
humbly,  loyally,  as  before. 

Don't  I  know?  Have  I  not  been  there?  It  is  no 
child's  play,  the  life  of  a  man  who — paraphrasing  the 
language  of  Spartacus,  the  much  neglected  hero  of  the 
ages — has  met  upon  the  printed  page  every  shape  of 
perilous  adventure  and  dangerous  character  that  the 
broad  empire  of  fiction  could  furnish,  and  never  yet 
lowered  his  arm.  Believe  me  it  is  no  carpet  duty  to 
have  served  on  the  Bristish  privateers  in  Guiana,  under 
Comnaodore  Kingsley,  alongside  of  Salvation  Yeo;  to 
have  been  a  loyal  member  of  Thuggee  and  cast  the 
scarf  for  Bowanee;  to  have  watched  the  tortures  of 
Beatrice  Cenci  (pronounced  as  written  in  honest 
English,  and  I  spit  upon  the  weaklings  of  the  service 
who  imagine  that  any  freak  of  woman  called  Bee-ah- 
treech-y  Chon-chy  could  have  endured  the  agonies 
related  of  that  sainted  lady) — to  have  watched  those 
tortures,  I  say,  without  breaking  down ;  to  have  fought 
under  the  walls  of  Acre  with  Richard  Coeur  de  Lion; 
to  have  crawled,  amid  rats  and  noxious  vapors,  with 
Jean  Valjean  through  the  sewers  of  Paris;  to  have 
dragged  weary  miles  through  the  snow  with  Uncas, 
Chief  of  the  Mohicans;  to  have  lived  among  wild 
beasts  with  Morok  the  lion  tamer;  to  have  charged 
with  the  impis  of  Umslopogaas;  to  have  sailed  before 
the  mast  with  Vanderdecken,  spent  fourteen  gloomy 
years  in  the  next  cell  to  Edmund  Dantes,  ferreted  out 
the  murders  in  the  Rue  Morgue,  advised  Monsieur 
Le  Cocq  and  given  years  of  life's  prime  in  tedious 
professional  assistance  to  that  anointed  idiot  and  pes- 
tiferous scoundrel.  Tittlebat  Titmouse! 


A      RHAPSODY 


Equally,  of  course,  it  has  not  been  all  horror  and 
despair.  Life  averages  up  fairly,  as  any  novel-reader 
will  admit,  and  there  has  been  much  of  delight — even 
luxury  and  idleness — between  the  carnage  hours  of 
battle.  Is  it  not  so?  Ask  that  boyish -hearted  old 
scamp  whom  you  have  seen  scuttling  away  from  the 
circulating  library  with  M.  St.  Pierre's  memoirs  of 
young  Paul  and  his  beloved  Virginia  under  his  arm; 
or  stepping  briskly  out  of  the  book  store  hugging  to  his 
left  side  a  carefully  wrapped  biography  of  Lady  Diana 
Vernon,  Mile,  de  la  Valliere,  or  Madame  Margaret 
Woffington;  or  in  fact  any  of  a  thousand  charming 
ladies  whom  it  is  certain  he  had  met  before.  Ladies 
too,  who,  born  whensoever,  are  not  one  day  older  since 
he  last  saw  them.  Nearly  a  hundred  years  of  Parisian 
residence  have  not  served  to  induce  the  Princess  Haydee 
of  Yanina  to  forego  her  picturesque  Greek  gowns  and 
coiffures,  or  to  alter  the  somewhat  embarrassing  status 
of  her  relations  with  her  striking  but  gloomy  protector, 
the  Count  of  Monte  Cristo. 

The  old  memories  are  crowded  with  pleasures. 
Those  delicious  mornings  in  the  allee  of  the  park, 
where  you  were  permitted  to  see  Cosette  with  her  old 
grandfather,  M.  Fauchelevent;  those  hours  of  sweet 
pain  when  it  was  impossible  to  determine  whether  it 
was  Rebecca  or  Rowena  who  seemed  to  give  most  light 
to  the  day;  the  flirtations  with  Blanche  Amory,  and 
the  notes  placed  in  the  hollow  tree ;  the  idyllic  devotion 
of  Little  Emily,  dating  from  the  morning  when  you 
saw  her  dress  fluttering  on  the  beam  as  she  ran  along 
it,  lightly,  above  the  flowing  tide — (devotion  that  is  yet 
tender,  for,  God  forgive  you  Steerforth  as  I  do,  you 
could  not  smirch  that  pure  heart;)  the  melancholy, 
yet  sweet  sorrow,  with  which  you  saw  the  loved  and 
lost  Little  Eva  borne  to  her  grave  over  which  the  mock- 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 


ing-bird  now  sings  his  liquid  requiem.  Has  it  not  been 
sweet  good  fortune  to  love  Maggie  Tulliver,  Margot  of 
Savoy,  Dora  Spenlow  (undeclared  because  she  was  an 
honest  wife — even  though  of  a  most  conceited  and 
commonplace  jackass,  totally  undeserving  of  her); 
Agnes  Wicklow  (a  passion  quickly  cured  when  she 
took  Dora's  pitiful  leavings),  and  poor  ill-fated  Marie 
Antoinette?  You  can  name  dozens  if  you  have  been 
brought  up  in  good  literary  society. 


These  love  affairs  may  be  owned  freely,  as  being 
perfectly  honorable,  even  if  hopeless.  And,  of  course, 
there  have  been  gallantries — mere  affaires  du  jour — 
such  as  every  man  occasionally  engages  in.  Sometimes 
they  seemed  serious,  but  only  for  a  moment.  There 
was  Beatrix  Esmond,  for  whom  I  could  certainly  have 
challenged  His  Grace  of  Hamilton,  had  not  Loi-d  Mohun 
done  the  work  for  me.  Wandering  down  the  street  in 
London  one  night,  in  a  moment  of  weak  admiration  for 
her  unrivalled  nerve  and  aplomb,  I  was  hesitating — 
whether  to  call  on  Mrs.  Rawdon  Crawley,  knowing 
that  her  thick-headed  husband  was  in  hoc  for  debt — 
when  the  door  of  her  house  crashed  open  and  that  old 
scoundrel,  Lord  Steyne,  came  wildly  down  the  steps, 
his  livid  face  blood-streaked,  his  topcoat  on  his  arm 
and  a  dreadful  look  in  his  eye.  The  world  knows  the 
rest  as  I  learned  it  half  an  hour  later  at  the  green- 
grocer's, where  the  Crawleys  owed  an  inexcusably 
large  bill.  Then  the  Duchess  de  Langeais — but  all 
this  is  really  private. 

After  all,  a  man  never  truly  loves  but  once.  And 
somewhere  in  Scotland  there  is  a  mound  above  the 
gentle,  tender  and  heroic  Helen  Mar,  where  lies  buried 
the  first  love  of  my  soul.     That  movmd,  O  lovely  and 


A     RHAPSODY 


loyal  Helen,  was  watered  by  the  first  blinding  and 
unselfish  tears  that  ever  sprang  from  my  eyes.  You 
were  my  first  love;  others  may  come  and  inevitably 
they  go,  but  you  are  still  here,  under  the  pencil  pocket 
of  my  waistcoat. 

Who  can  write  in  such  a  state?     It  is  only  fair  to 
take  a  rest  and  brace  up. 


13 


II. 
NOVEL-READERS 

AS  DISTINGUISHED   FROM  WOMEN   AND 
NIBBLERS  AND   AMATEURS 

'TpHERE  is,  of  course,  but  one  sort  of  novel- 
reader  who  is  of  any  importance.  He  is  the  man 
who  began  under  the  age  of  fourteen  and  is  still  stick- 
ing to  it — at  whatever  age  he  may  be — and  full  of  a 
terrifying  anxiety  lest  he  may  be  called  away  in  the 
midst  of  preliminary  announcements  of  some  pet 
author's  "next  forthcoming."  For  my  own  part  I  can- 
not conceive  dying  with  resignation  knowing  that  the 
publishers  were  binding  up  at  the  time  anything  of 
Henryk  Sienckiewicz's  or  Thomas  Hardy's.  So  it  is 
important  that  a  man  begin  early,  because  he  will 
have  to  quit  all  too  soon. 

There  are  no  women  novel-readers.  There  are 
women  who  read  novels,  of  course;  but  it  is  a  far  cry 
from  reading  novels  to  being  a  novel-reader.  It  is 
not  in  the  nature  of  a  woman.  The  crown  of  woman's 
character  is  her  devotion,  which  incarnate  delicacy 
and  tenderness  exalt  into  perfect  beauty  of  sacrifice. 
Those  qualities  could  no  more  live  amid  the  clashings 
of  indiscriminate  human  passions  than  a  butterfly  wing 
could  go  between  the  mill  rollers  untom.  Women 
utterly  refuse  to  go  on  with  a  book  if  the  subject  goes 
against  their  settled  opinions.  They  despise  a  novel — 
howsoever  fine  and  stirring  it  may  be — if  there  is  any 
taint  of  unhappiness  to  the  favorite  at  the  close.     But 

IS 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 


the  most  flagrant  of  all  their  incapacities  in  respect  to 
fiction  is  the  inability  to  appreciate  the  admirable 
achievements  of  heroes,  unless  the  achievements  are 
solely  in  behalf  of  women.  And  even  in  that  event 
they  complacently  consider  them  to  be  a  matter  of 
course,  and  attach  no  particular  importance  to  the 
perils  or  the  hardships  undergone.  "Why  shouldn't 
he?"  they  argue,  with  triumphant  trust  in  ideals; 
"surely  he  loved  her!" 

There  are  many  women  who  nibble  at  novels  as  they 
nibble  at  luncheon — there  are  also  some  hearty  eaters; 
but  98  per  cent  of  them  detest  Thackeray  and  refuse 
resolutely  to  open  a  second  book  of  Robert  Louis 
Stevenson.  They  scent  an  enemy  of  the  sex  in  Thack- 
eray, who  never  seems  to  be  in  earnest,  and  whose 
indignant  sarcasm  and  melancholy  truthfulness  they 
shrink  from.  "It's  only  a  story,  anyhow,"  they  argue 
again;  "he  might,  at  least  write  a  pleasant  one,  instead 
of  bringing  in  all  sorts  of  disagreeable  people — some 
of  them  positively  disreputable."  As  for  Stevenson, 
whom  men  read  with  the  thrill  of  boyhood  rising  new 
in  their  veins,  I  believe  in  my  soul  women  would  tear 
leaves  out  of  his  novels  to  tie  over  the  tops  of  preserve 
jars,  and  never  dream  of  the  sacrilege. 

Now  I  hold  Thackeray  and  Stevenson  to  be  the 
absolute  test  of  capacity  for  earnest  novel-reading. 
Neither  cares  a  snap  of  his  fingers  for  anybody's  preju- 
dices, but  goes  the  way  of  stern  truth  by  the  light  of 
genius  that  shines  within  him. 

If  you  could  ever  pin  a  woman  down  to  tell  you  what 
she  thought,  instead  of  telling  you  what  she  thinks  it 
is  proper  to  tell  you,  or  what  she  thinks  will  please  you, 
you  would  find  she  has  a  religious  conviction  that  Dot 
Perrybingle  in  "The  Cricket  of  the  Hearth,"  and 
Ouida's  Lord  Chandos  were  actually  a  materializable 

16 


NOVEL-READERS 


woman  and  a  reasonable  gentleman,  either  of  whom 
might  be  met  with  anywhere  in  their  proper  circles. 
I  would  be  willing  to  stand  trial  for  perjury  on  the 
statement  that  I've  known  admirable  women — far 
above  the  average,  really  showing  signs  of  moral  dis- 
crimination— who  have  sniveled  pitifully  over  Nancy 
Sykes  and  sniffed  scornfully  at  Mrs.  Tess  Durbeyfield 
Clare.  It  is  due  to  their  constitution  and  social  hered- 
ity. Women  do  not  strive  and  yearn  and  stalk  abroad 
for  the  glorious  pot  of  intellectual  gold  at  the  end  of  the 
rainbow;  they  pick  and  choose  and,  having  chosen,  sit 
down  straightway  and  become  content.  And  a  state 
of  contentment  is  an  abomination  in  the  sight  of  man. 
Contentment  is  to  be  sought  for  by  great  masculine 
minds  only  with  the  purpose  of  being  sure  never  quite 
to  find  it. 


For  all  practical  purposes,  therefore — except  per- 
haps as  object  lessons  of  "the  incorrect  method"  in 
reading  novels — women,  as  novel-readers,  must  be 
considered  as  not  existing.  And,  of  course,  no  offense 
is  intended.  But  if  there  be  any  weak-kneed  readers 
who  prefer  the  gilt-wash  of  pretty  politeness  to  the 
solid  gold  of  truth,  let  them  understand  that  I  am  not 
to  be  frightened  away  from  plain  facts  by  any  charge 
of  bad  manners. 

On  the  contrary,  now  that  this  disagreeable  inter- 
ruption has  been  forced  upon  me — certainly  not  through 
any  seeking  of  mine — it  may  be  better  to  speak  out  and 
settle  the  matter.  Men  who  have  the  happiness  of 
being  in  the  married  state  know  that  nothing  is  to  be 
gained  by  failing  to  settle  instantly  with  women  who 
contradict  and  oppose  them.  Who  was  that  mellow 
philosopher    in    one    of   Trollope's    tiresomely    clever 

17 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 


novels  who  said:  "My  word  for  it,  John,  a  husband 
ought  not  to  take  a  cane  to  his  wife  too  soon.  He 
should  fairly  wait  till  they  are  half-way  home  from  the 
church — but  not  longer,  not  longer."  Of  course 
every  man  with  a  spark  of  intelligence  and  gallantry 
wishes  that  women  COULD  rise  to  real  novel-reading. 
Think  what  courtship  would  be!  Every  true  man 
wishes  to  heaven  there  was  nothing  more  to  be  said 
against  women  than  that  they  are  not  novel-readers. 
But  can  mere  forgetting  remove  the  canker?  Do  not 
all  of  us  know  that  the  abstract  good  of  the  very 
existence  of  woman  is  itself  open  to  grave  doubt — 
with  no  immediate  hope  of  clearing  up?  Woman  has 
certainly  been  thrust  upon  us.  Is  there  any  scrap  of 
record  to  show  that  Adam  asked  for  her?  He  was 
doing  very  well,  was  happy,  prosperous  and  healthy. 
There  was  no  certainty  that  her  creation  was  one  of 
that  unquestionably  wonderful  series  that  occupied 
the  six  great  days.  We  cannot  conceal  that  her 
creation  caused  a  great  pain  in  Adam's  side — undoubt- 
edly the  left  side,  in  the  region  of  the  heart.  She  has 
been  described  by  young  and  dauntless  poets  as  "God's 
best  afterthought;"  but,  now,  really — and  I  advance 
the  suggestion  with  no  intention  to  be  brutal  but  solely 
as  a  conscientious  duty  to  the  ascertainment  of  truth — 
why  is  it,  that — .  But  let  me  try  to  present  the  matter 
in  the  most  unobjectionable  manner  possible. 

In  reading  over  that  marvelous  account  of  creation 
I  find  frequent  explicit  declaration  that  God  pronounced 
everything  good  after  he  had  created  it — except  heaven 
and  woman.  I  have  maintained  sometimes  to  stern, 
elderly  ladies  that  this  might  have  been  an  error  of 
omission  by  early  copyists,  perpetuated  and  so  become 
fixed  in  our  translations. 

18 


NOVEL-READERS 


To  other  ladies,  of  other  age  and  condition,  to  whom 
such  propositions  of  scholarship  might  appear  to  be 
dull  pedantry,  I  have  ventured  the  gentlemanlike 
explanation  that,  as  woman  was  the  only  living  thing 
created  that  was  good  beyond  doubt,  perhaps  God  had 
paid  her  the  special  compliment  of  leaving  the  approval 
unspoken,  as  being  in  a  sense  supererogatory.  At 
best,  either  of  these  dispositions  of  the  matter  is,  of 
course,  far-fetched,  maybe  even  frivolous.  The  fact 
still  remains  by  the  record.  And  it  is  beyond  doubt 
awkward  and  embarrassing,  because  ill-natured  men 
can  refer  to  it  in  moments  of  hatefulness — moments 
unfortunately  too  frequent. 

Is  it  possible  that  this  last  creation  was  a  mistake  of 
Infinite  Charity  and  Eternal  Truth?  That  Charity 
forbore  to  acknowledge  that  it  was  a  mistake  and  that 
Truth,  in  the  very  nature  of  its  eternal  essence,  could 
not  say  it  was  good?  It  is  so  grave  a  matter  that  one 
wonders  Helvetius  did  not  betray  it,  as  he  did  that 
other  secret  about  which  the  philosophers  had  agreed 
to  keep  mum,  so  that  Herr  Schopenhauer  could  write 
about  it  as  he  did  about  that  other.  Herr  Schopenhauer 
certainly  had  the  courage  to  speak  with  philosophical 
asperity  of  the  gentle  sex.  It  may  be  because  he  was 
never  married.  And  then  his  mother  wrote  novels! 
I  have  been  surprised  that  he  was  not  accused  of  prej- 
udice. 


But  if  all  these  everyday  obstacles  were  absent  there 
would  yet  remain  insurmountable  reasons  why  women 
can  never  be  novel-readers  in  the  sense  that  men  are. 
Your  wife,  for  instance,  or  the  impenetrable  mystery 
of  womanhood  that  you  contemplate  making  your  wife 
some  day — can  you,  honestly,  now,  as  a  self-respecting 

19 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 


husband,  either  de  facto  or  in  futuro,  quite  agree  to 
the  spectacle  of  that  adored  lady  sitting  over  across  the 
hearth  from  you  in  the  snug  room,  evening  after  even- 
ing, with  her  feet — however  small  and  well-shaped — 
cocked  up  on  the  other  end  of  the  mantel  and  one  of 
your  own  big  Colorado  maduros  between  her  teeth! 
We  men,  and  particularly  novel-readers,  are  liberal, 
even  generous,  in  our  views;  but  it  is  not  in  human 
nature  to  stand  that  I 

Now,  if  a  woman  can  not  put  her  feet  up  and  smoke, 
how  in  the  name  of  heaven,  can  she  seriously  read 
novels?  Certainly  not  sitting  bolt  upright,  in  order 
to  prevent  the  back  of  her  new  gown  from  rubbing  the 
chair;  certainly  not  reclining  upon  a  couch  or  in  a 
hammock.  A  boy,  yet  too  young  to  smoke  may 
properly  lie  on  his  stomach  on  the  floor  and  read  novels, 
but  the  mature  veteran  will  fight  for  his  end  of  the  man- 
tel as  for  his  wife  and  children.  It  is  physiological 
necessity,  inasmuch  as  the  blood  that  would  naturally 
go  to  the  lower  extremities,  is  thus  measurably  lessened 
in  quantity  and  goes  instead  to  the  head,  where  a 
state  of  gentle  congestion  ensues,  exciting  the  brain 
cells,  setting  free  the  imagination  to  roam  hand  in  hand 
with  intelligence  under  the  spell  of  the  wizard.  There 
may  be  novel-readers  who  do  not  smoke  at  the  game, 
but  surely  they  cannot  be  quite  earnest  or  honest — 
you  had  better  put  in  writing  all  business  agreements 
with  this  sort. 


No  boy  can  ever  hope  to  become  a  really  great  or 
celebrated  novel-reader  who  does  not  begin  his  appren- 
ticeship under  the  age  of  fourteen,  and,  as  I  said  before, 
stick  to  it  as  long  as  he  lives.  He  must  learn  to  scorn 
those  frivolous,  vacillating  and  purposeless  ones  who. 


NOVEL-READERS 

after  beginning  properly,  turn  aside  and  fritter  away 
their  time  on  mere  history,  or  science,  or  philosophy. 
In  a  sense  these  departments  of  literature  are  useful 
enough.  They  enable  you  often  to  perceive  the  most 
cunning  and  profoundly  interesting  touches  in  fiction. 
Then  I  have  no  doubt  that,  merely  as  mental  exercise, 
they  do  some  good  in  keeping  the  mind  in  training  for 
the  serious  work  of  novel-reading.  I  have  always 
been  grateful  to  Carlyle's  "French  Revolution,"  if 
for  nothing  more  than  that  its  criss-cross,  confusing 
and  impressive  dullness  enabled  me  to  find  more  pleas- 
ure in  "A  Tale  of  Two  Cities"  than  was  to  be  extracted 
from  any  merit  or  interest  in  that  unreal  novel. 

This  much  however,  may  be  said  of  history,  that  it  is 
looking  up  in  these  days  as  a  result  of  studying  the 
spirit  of  the  novel.  It  was  not  many  years  ago  that 
the  ponderous  gentlemen  who  write  criticisms  (chiefly 
because  it  has  been  forgotten  how  to  stop  that  ancient 
waste  of  paper  and  ink)  could  find  nothing  more  biting 
to  say  of  Macaulay's  "'England"  than  that  it  was  "a 
splendid  work  of  imagination,"  of  Froude's  "Caesar 
that  it  was  "magnificent  political  fiction,"  and  of 
Taine's  "France"  that  "it  was  so  fine  it  should  have  been 
history  instead  of  fiction."  And  ever  since  then  the 
world  has  read  only  these  three  writers  upon  these  three 
epochs — and  many  other  men  have  been  writing 
history  upon  the  same  model.  No  good  novel-reader 
need  be  ashamed  to  read  them,  in  fact.  They  are  so 
like  the  real  thing  we  find  in  the  greatest  novels, 
instead  of  being  the  usual  pompous  official  lies  of  old- 
time  history,  that  there  are  flesh,  blood  and  warmth 
in  them. 

In  1877,  after  the  railway  riots,  legislative  halls 
heard  the  French  Revolution  rehearsed  from  all  points 
of  view.     In  one  capital,  where  I  was  reporting  the 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 


debate,  Old  Oracle,  with  every  fact  at  hand  from  "In 
the  beginning"  to  the  exact  popular  vote  in  1876, 
talked  two  hours  of  accurate  historical  data  from  all 
the  French  histories,  after  which  a  young  lawyer  replied 
in  fifteen  minutes  with  a  vivid  picture  of  the  popular 
conditions,  the  revolt  and  the  result.  Will  it  be  allow- 
able, in  the  interest  of  conveying  exact  impression,  to 
say  that  Old  Oracle  was  "swiped"  off  the  earth?  No 
other  word  will  relieve  my  conscience.  After  it  was  all 
over  I  asked  the  young  lawyer  where  he  got  his  French 
history. 

"From  Dumas,"  he  answered,  "and  from  critical 
reviews  of  his  novels.  He's  short  on  dates  and  docu- 
ments, but  he's  long  on  the  general  facts." 

Why  not?     Are  not  novels  history? 

Book  for  book,  is  not  a  novel  by  a  competent, 
conscientious  novelist  just  as  truthful  a  record  of 
typical  men,  manners  and  motives  as  formal  history  is 
of  official  men,  events  and  motives? 

There  are  persons  created  out  of  the  dreams  of 
genius  so  real,  so  actual,  so  burnt  into  the  heart  and 
mind  of  the  world  that  they  have  become  historical. 
Do  they  not  show  you,  in  the  old  Ursuline  Convent  at 
New  Orleans,  the  cell  where  poor  Manon  Lescaut  sat 
alone  in  tears?  And  do  they  not  show  you  her  very 
grave  on  the  banks  of  the  lake?  Have  I  not  stood  by 
the  simple  grave  at  Richmond,  Virginia,  where  never 
lay  the  body  of  Pocahontas  and  listened  to  the  story 
of  her  burial  there?  One  of  the  loveliest  women  I  ever 
knew  admits  that  every  time  she  visits  relatives  at 
Salem  she  goes  out  to  look  at  the  mound  over  the  broken 
heart  of  Hester  Prynne,  that  dream  daughter  of  genius 
who  never  actually  lived  or  died,  but  who  was  and  is 
and  ever  will  be.  Her  grave  can  be  easily  pointed  out, 
but  where  is  that  of  Alexander,  of  Themistocles,  of 


NOVEL-READERS 


Aristotle,  even  of  the  first  figure  of  history — Adam? 
Mark  Twain  found  it  for  a  joke.  Dr.  Hale  was  finally 
forced  to  write  a  preface  to  "The  Man  Without  a 
Country"  to  declare  that  his  hero  was  pure  fiction  and 
that  the  pathetic  punishment  so  marvelously  described 
was  not  only  imaginary,  but  legally  and  actually 
impossible.  It  was  because  Philip  Nolan  had  passed 
into  history.  I  myself  have  met  old  men  who  knew  sea 
captains  that  had  met  this  melancholy  prisoner  at  sea 
and  looked  upon  him,  had  even  spoken  to  him  upon 
subjects  not  prohibited.  And  these  old  men  did  not 
hesitate  to  declare  that  Dr.  Hale  had  lied  in  his  denial 
and  had  repudiated  the  facts  through  cowardice  or 
under  compulsion  from  the  War  Department. 


Indeed,  so  flexible,  adaptable  and  penetrable  is  the 
style,  and  so  admirably  has  the  use  and  proper  direc- 
tion of  the  imagination  been  developed  by  the  school 
of  fiction,  that  every  branch  of  literature  has  gained 
from  it  power,  beauty  and  clearness.  Nothing  has 
aided  more  in  the  spread  of  liberal  Christianity  than 
the  remarkable  series  of  "Lives  of  Christ,"  from  Straus 
to  Farrar,  not  omitting  particular  mention  of  the  singu- 
larly beautiful  treatment  of  the  subject  by  Renan. 
In  all  of  these  conscientious  imagination  has  been 
used,  as  it  is  used  in  the  highest  works  of  fiction,  to 
give  to  known  facts  the  atmosphere  and  vividness  of 
truth  in  order  that  the  spirit  and  personality  of  the 
surroundings  of  the  Savior  of  Mankind  might  be  newly 
understood  by  and  made  fresh  to  modern  perception. 

Of  all  books  it  is  to  be  said — of  novels  as  well —  that 
none  is  great  that  is  not  true,  and  that  cannot  be  true 
which  does  not  carry  inherence  of  truth.  Now  every 
book  is  true  to  some  reader.     The  "Arabian  Nights" 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 


tales  do  not  seem  impossible  to  a  little  child,  they 
only  delight  him.  The  novels  of  "The  Duchess"  seem 
true  to  a  certain  class  of  readers,  if  only  because  they 
treat  of  a  society  to  which  those  readers  are  entirely 
unaccustomed.  "Robinson  Crusoe"  is  a  gospel  to  the 
world,  and  yet  it  is  the  most  palpably  and  innocently 
impossible  of  books.  It  is  so  plausible  because  the 
author  has  ingeniously  or  accidentally  set  aside  the 
usual  earmarks  of  plausibility.  When  an  author 
plainly  and  easily  knows  what  the  reader  does  not  know, 
and  enough  more  to  continue  the  chain  of  seeming 
reality  of  truth  a  little  further,  he  convinces  the  reader 
of  his  truth  and  ability.  Those  men,  therefore,  who 
have  been  endowed  with  the  genius  almost  uncon- 
sciously to  absorb,  classify,  combine,  arrange  and  dis- 
pense vast  knowledge  in  a  bold,  striking  or  noble 
manner,  are  the  recognized  greatest  men  of  genius  for 
the  simple  reason  that  the  readers  of  the  world  who 
know  most  recognize  all  they  know  in  these  writers, 
together  with  that  spirit  of  sublime  imagination  that 
suggests  still  greater  realms  of  truth  and  beauty. 
What  Shakesepare  was  to  the  intellectual  leaders  of 
his  day,  "The  Duchess"  was  to  countless  immature 
young  folks  of  her  day  who  were  looking  for  "some- 
thing to  read." 

All  truth   is  history,   but   all   history  is  not  truth. 
Written  history  is  notoriously  no  well-cleaner. 


III. 
READING  THE  FIRST  NOVEL 

BEING  MOSTLY  REMINISCENCES  OF  EARLY 
CRIMES   AND    JOYS 

/^NCE  more  and  for  all,  the  career  of  a  novel 
^^  reader  should  be  entered  upon,  if  at  all,  under 
the  age  of  fourteen.  As  much  earlier  as  possible. 
The  life  of  the  intellect,  as  of  its  shadowy  twin,  imagi- 
nation, begins  early  and  develops  miraculously.  The 
inbred  strains  of  nature  lie  exposed  to  influence  as  a 
mirror  to  reflections,  and  as  open  to  impression  as 
sensitized  paper,  upon  which  pictures  may  be  printed 
and  from  which  they  may  also  fade  out.  The  greater 
the  variety  of  impressions  that  fall  upon  the  young 
mind  the  more  certain  it  is  that  the  greatest  strength 
of  natural  tendency  will  be  touched  and  revealed. 
Good  or  bad,  whichever  it  may  be,  let  it  come  out  as 
quickly  as  possible.  How  many  men  have  never 
developed  their  fatal  weaknesses  until  success  was 
within  reach  and  the  edifice  fell  upon  other  innocent 
ones.  Believe  me,  no  innate  scoundrel  or  brute  will 
be  much  helped  or  hindered  by  stories.  These  have 
no  turn  or  leisure  for  dreaming.  They  are  eager  for 
the  actual  touch  of  life.  What  would  a  dull-eyed 
glutton,  famishing,  not  with  hunger  but  with  the  crav- 
ings of  digestive  ferocity,  find  in  Thackeray's  "Memorials 
of  Gormandizing"  or  "Barmecidal  Feasts?"  Such 
banquets  are  spread  for  the  frugal,  not  one  of  whom 
would  swap  that  immortal  cook-book  review  for  a 
dinner  with  LucuUus. 


THE    DELICIOUS     VICE 


Rascals  will  not  read.  Men  of  action  do  not  read. 
They  look  upon  it  as  the  gambler  does  upon  the  game 
where  "no  money  passes."  It  may  almost  be  said  that 
the  capacity  for  novel-reading  is  the  patent  of  just 
and  noble  minds.  You  never  heard  of  a  great  novel- 
reader  who  was  notorious  as  a  criminal.  There  have 
been  literary  criminals,  I  grant  you — Eugene  Aram, 
Dr.  Dodd,  Prof.  Webster,  who  murdered  Parkman, 
and  others.  But  they  were  writers,  not  readers. 
And  they  did  not  write  novels.  Mr.  Aram  wrote 
scientific  and  school  books,  as  did  Prof.  Webster,  and 
Dr.  Wainwright  wrote  beautiful  sermons.  We  never 
do  sufficiently  consider  the  evil  that  lies  behind  writing 
sermons.  The  nearest  you  can  come  to  a  writer  of 
fiction  who  has  been  steeped  in  crime  is  in  Benvenuto 
Cellini,  whose  marvelous  autobiographical  memoir 
certainly  contains  some  fiction,  though  it  is  classed 
under  the  suspect  department  of  History. 


How  many  men  actually  have  been  saved  from  a 
criminal  career  by  the  miraculous  influence  of  novels? 
Let  who  will  deny,  but  at  the  age  of  six  I  myself  was 
absolutely  committed  to  the  abandoned  purpose  of 
riding  barebacked  horses  in  a  circus.  Secretly,  of 
course,  because  there  were  some  vague  speculations  in 
the  family  concerning  what  seemed  to  be  special 
adaptability  to  the  work  of  preaching.  Shortly  after 
I  gave  that  up  to  enlist  in  the  Continental  Army,  under 
Gen.  Francis  Marion,  and  no  other  soldier  slew  more 
Britons.  After  discharge  I  at  once  volunteered  in  an 
Indiana  regiment  quartered  in  my  native  town  in 
Kentucky,  and  beat  the  snare  drum  at  the  head  of  that 
fine  body  of  men  for  a  long  time.  But  the  tendency 
was  downward.     For  three  months  I  was  chief  of  a 


THE     FIRST     NOVEL 


band  of  robbers  that  ravaged  the  backyards  of  the 
vicinity.  Successively  I  became  a  spy  for  Washington, 
an  Indian  fighter,  a  tragic  actor. 

With  character  seared,  abandoned  and  dissolute  in 
habit,  through  and  by  the  hearing  and  seeing  and 
reading  of  history,  there  was  but  one  desperate  step 
left.  So  I  entered  upon  the  career  of  a  pirate  in  my 
ninth  year.  The  Spanish  Main,  as  no  doubt  you 
remember,  was  at  that  time  upon  an  open  common 
across  the  street  from  our  house,  and  it  was  a  hundred 
feet  long,  half  as  wide  and  would  average  two  feet  in 
depth.  I  have  often  since  thanked  Heaven  that  they 
filled  up  that  pathless  ocean  in  order  to  build  an  iron 
foundry  upon  the  spot.  Suppose  they  had  excavated 
for  a  cellar!  Why  during  the  time  that  Capt.  Kidd, 
Lafitte  and  I  infested  the  coast  thereabout,  sailing 
three  "low,  black-hulled  schooners  with  long  rakish 
masts,"  I  forced  hundreds  of  merchant  seamen  to  walk 
the  plank — even  helpless  women  and  children.  Unless 
the  sharks  devoured  them,  their  bones  are  yet  about 
three  feet  under  the  floor  of  that  iron  foundry.  Under 
the  lee  of  the  Northernmost  promontory,  near  a  rock 
marked  with  peculiar  crosses  made  by  the  point  of  the 
stiletto  which  I  constantly  carried  in  my  red  silk  sash, 
I  buried  tons  of  plate,  and  doubloons,  pieces  of  eight, 
pistoles,  Louis  d'ors,  and  galleons  by  the  chest.  At 
that  time  galleons  somehow  meant  to  me  money 
pieces  in  use,  though  since  then  the  name  has  been 
given  to  a  species  of  boat.  The  rich  brocades,  Damas- 
cus and  Indian  stuffs,  laces,  mantles,  shawls  and  finery 
were  piled  in  riotous  profusion  in  our  cave  where — 
let  the  whole  truth  be  told  if  it  must — I  lived  with  a 
bold,  black-eyed  and  coquettish  Spanish  girl,  who 
loved  me  with  ungovernable  jealousy  that  occasionally 
led  to  bitter  and  terrible  scenes  of  rage  and  despair. 

27 


THE    DELICIOUS     VICE 


At  last  when  I  brought  home  a  white  and  red  English 
girl  whose  life  I  spared  because  she  had  begged  me  on 
her  knees  by  the  memory  of  my  sainted  mother  to  spare 
her  for  her  old  father,  who  was  waiting  her  coming, 
Joquita  passed  all  bounds.  I  killed  her — with  a  single 
knife  thrust  I  remember.  She  was  buried  right  on 
the  spot  where  the  Tilden  and  Hendricks  flag  pole 
afterwards  stood  in  the  campaign  of  1876.  It  was  with 
bitter  melancholy  that  I  fancied  the  red  stripes  on  the 
flag  had  their  color  from  the  blood  of  the  poor,  foolish, 
jealous  girl  below. 

*     *     * 

Ah,  well — 

Let  us  all  own  up — we  men  of  above  forty  who  aspire 
to  respectability  and  do  actually  live  orderly  lives  and 
achieve  even  the  odor  of  sanctity — have  we  not  been 
stained  with  murder? — aye  worst !  What  man  has  not 
his  Bluebeard  closet,  full  of  early  crimes  and  villainies? 
A  certain  boy  in  whom  I  take  a  particular  interest, 
who  goes  to  Sunday-school  and  whose  life  is  outwardly 
proper — is  he  not  now  on  week  days  a  robber  of  great 
renown?  A  week  ago,  masked  and  armed,  he  held  up 
his  own  father  in  a  secluded  corner  of  the  library  and 
relieved  the  old  man  of  swag  of  a  value  beyond  the 
dreams — not  of  avarice,  but — of  successful,  respectable, 
modern  speculation.  He  purposes  to  be  a  pirate 
whenever  there  is  a  convenient  sheet  of  water  near  the 
house.  God  speed  him.  Better  a  pirate  at  six  than 
at  sixty. 

Give  them  work  to  do  and  good  novels  to  read  and 
they  will  get  over  it.  History  breeds  queer  ideas  in 
children.  They  read  of  military  heroes,  kings  and 
statesmen  who  commit  awful  deeds  and  are  yet  monu- 
ments of  public  honor.  What  a  sweet  hero  is  Raleigh, 
who  was  a  farmer  of  piracy ;  what  a  grand  Admiral  was 


THE     FIRST     NOVEL 


Drake;  what  demigods  the  fighting  Americans  who 
murdered  Indians  for  the  crime  of  wanting  their  own! 
History  hath  charms  to  move  an  infant  breast  to  savag- 
ery. Good,  strong  novels  are  the  best  pabulum  to 
nourish  the  difference  between  virtue  and  vice. 

Don't  I  know?  I  have  felt  the  miracle  and  learned 
the  difference  so  well  that  even  now  at  an  advanced 
age  I  can  tell  the  difference  and  indulge  in  either.  It 
was  not  a  week  after  the  killing  of  Joquita  that  I  read 
the  first  novel  of  my  life.  It  was  "Scottish  Chiefs." 
The  dead  bodies  of  ten  thousand  novels  lie  between  me 
and  that  first  one.  I  have  not  read  it  since.  Ten 
Incas  of  Peru  with  ten  rooms  full  of  solid  gold  could 
not  tempt  me  to  read  it  again.  Have  I  not  a  clear 
cinch  on  a  delicious  memory,  compared  with  which 
gold  is  only  Robinson  Crusoe's  "drug?"  After  a  lapse 
of  all  these  years  the  content  of  that  one  tremendous, 
noble  chapter  of  heroic  climax  is  as  deeply  burned 
into  my  memory  as  if  it  had  been  read  yesterday. 

A  sister,  old  enough  to  receive  "beaux"  and  addicted 
to  the  piano-forte  accomplishment,  was  at  that  time 
practicing  across  the  hall  an  instrumental  composition, 
entitled,  "La  Reve."  Under  the  title,  printed  in  very 
small  letters,  was  the  English  translation;  but  I  never 
thought  to  look  at  it.  An  elocutionist  had  shortly 
before  recited  Poe's  Raven  at  a  church  entertainment, 
and  that  gloomy  bird  flapped  its  wings  in  my  young 
emotional  vicinity  when  the  firelight  threw  vague 
"shadows  on  the  floor."  When  the  piece  of  music  was 
spoken  as  "La  Reve,"  its  sad  cadences,  suffering,  of 
course,  under  practice,  were  instantly  wedded  in  my 
mind  to  Mr.  Poe's  wonderful  bird  and  for  years  it 
meant  the  "Raven"  to  me.  How  curious  are  childish 
impressions.     Years  afterward  when  I  saw  a  copy  of 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 


the  music  and  read  the  translation,  "The  Dream," 
under  the  title,  I  felt  a  distinct  shock  of  resentment  as  if 
the  French  language  had  been  treacherous  to  my  sacred 
ideals.  Then  there  was  the  romantic  name  of  "Ellers- 
lie,"  which,  notwithstanding  considerable  precocity 
in  reading  and  spelling  I  carried  off  as  "EUeressie." 
Years  afterward  when  the  actual  syllables  confronted 
me  in  a  historical  sketch  of  Wallace,  the  truth  entered 
like  a  stab  and  I  closed  the  book.  O  sacred  first  illu- 
sions of  childhood,  you  are  sweeter  than  a  thousand 
years  of  fame!  It  is  God's  providence  that  hardens  us 
to  endure  the  throwing  of  them  down  to  our  eyes  and 
strengthens  us  to  keep  their  memory  sweet  in  our 
hearts. 


It  would  be  an  affront  then,  not  to  assume  that  every 
reputable  novel  reader  has  read  "Scottish  Chiefs." 
If  there  is  any  descendant  or  any  personal  friend  of  that 
admirable  lady.  Miss  Jane  Porter,  who  may  now  be  in 
pecuniary  distress,  let  that  descendant  call  upon  me 
privately  with  perfect  confidence.  There  are  obli- 
gations that  a  glacial  evolutionary  period  can  not  lessen. 
I  make  no  conditions  but  the  simple  proof  of  proper 
identity.     I  am  not  rich  but  I  am  grateful. 

It  was  a  Saturday  evening  when  I  became  aware, 
as  by  prescience,  that  there  hung  over  Sir  William 
Wallace  and  Helen  Mar  some  terrible  shadow  of  fate. 
And  the  piano-forte  across  the  hall  played  "La  Reve." 
My  heart  failed  me  and  I  closed  the  book.  If  you  can't 
do  that,  my  friend,  then  you  waste  your  time  trying  to 
be  a  novel  reader.  You  have  not  the  true  touch  of 
genius  for  it.  It  is  the  miracle  of  eating  your  cake  and 
having  it,  too.    It  must  have  been  the  unconscious 

30 


THE     FIRST     NOVEL 


moving  of  novel  reading  genius  in  me.  For  I  forgot,  as 
clearly  as  if  it  were  not  a  possibility,  that  the  next  day 
was  Sunday.  And  so  hurried  off,  before  time,  to  bed, 
to  be  alone  with  the  burden  on  my  heart. 

"Backward,  turn  backward,  O  Time  in  your  flight — 
Make  me  a  child  again  just  for  tonight." 

There  are  two  or  three  novels  I  should  love  to  take  to 
bed  as  of  yore — not  to  read,  but  to  suffer  over  and  to 
contemplate  and  to  seek  calmness  and  courage  with 
which  to  face  the  inevitable.  Could  there  be  men 
base  enough  to  do  to  death  the  noble  Wallace?  Or  to 
break  the  heart  of  Helen  Mar  with  grief?  No  argu- 
ment could  remove  the  presentiment,  but  facing  the 
matter  gave  courage.  "Let  tomorrow  answer,"  I 
thought,  as  the  piano-forte  in  the  next  room  played 
"La  Reve."     Then  fell  asleep. 

And  when  I  awoke  next  morning  to  the  full  knowledge 
that  it  was  Sunday,  I  could  have  murdered  the  calendar. 
For  Sunday  was  Dies  Irae.  After  Sunday-school, 
at  least.  There  is  a  certain  amount  of  fun  to  be 
extracted  from  Sunday-school.  The  remainder  of 
those  early  Sundays  was  confined  to  reading  the  Bible 
or  storybooks  from  the  Sunday-school  library — books, 
by  the  Lord  Harry,  that  seem  to  be  contrived  especially 
to  make  out  of  healthy  children  life-long  enemies  of  the 
church,  and  to  bind  hypocrites  to  the  altar  with  hooks 
of  steel.  There  was  no  whistling  at  all  permitted; 
singing  of  hymns  was  encouraged;  no  "playing" — 
playing  on  Sunday  was  a  distinct  source  of  displeasure 
to  Heaven!  Are  free-bom  men  nine  years  of  age  to 
endure  such  tyranny  with  resignation?  Ask  the 
kids  of  today — and  with  one  voice,  as  true  men  and 
free,  they  will  answer  you,  "Nit!"  In  the  dark  days 
of  my  youth  liberty  was  in  chains,  and  so  Sunday  was 
31 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 


passed  in  dreadful  suspense  as  to  what  was  doing  in 
Scotland. 

*     *     * 

Monday  night  after  supper  I  rejoined  Sir  William 
in  his  captivity  and  soon  saw  that  my  worst  fears  were 
to  be  realized.  My  father  sat  on  the  opposite  side  of 
the  table  reading  politics;  my  mother  was  effecting 
the  restoration  of  socks;  my  brother  was  engaged  in 
unraveling  mathematical  tangles,  and  in  the  parlor 
across  the  hall  my  sister  sat  alone  with  her  piano 
patiently  debating  "La  Reve."  Under  these  circum- 
stances I  encountered  the  first  great  miracle  of  intel- 
lectual emotion  in  the  chapter  describing  the  execution 
of  William  Wallace  on  Tower  Hill.  No  other  incident 
of  life  has  left  upon  me  such  a  profound  impression. 
It  was  as  if  I  had  sprung  at  one  bound  into  the  arena 
of  heroism.  I  remember  it  all.  How  Wallace  deliv- 
ered himself  of  theological  and  Christian  precepts  to 
Helen  Mar  after  which  they  both  knelt  before  the 
officiating  priest.  That  she  thought  or  said,  "My  life 
will  expire  with  yours!"  It  was  the  keynote  of  death 
and  life  devotion.  It  was  worthy  to  usher  Wallace  up 
the  scaff"old  steps  where  he  stood  with  his  hands  bound, 
"his  noble  head  uncovered."  There  was  much  Chris- 
tian edification,  but  the  presence  of  such  a  hero  as  he 
with  "noble  Head  uncovered"  would  enable  any  man 
nine  years  old  with  a  spark  of  honor  and  sympathy  in 
him  to  endure  agonizing  amounts  of  edification.  Then 
suddenly  there  was  a  frightful  shudder  in  my  heart. 
The  hangman  approached  with  the  rope,  and  Helen 
Mar,  with  a  shriek,  threw  herself  upon  Wallace's 
32 


THE     FIRST     NOVEL 


breast.  Then  the  great  moment.  If  I  live  a  thousand 
years  these  lines  will  always  be  with  me:  "Wallace, 
with  a  mighty  strength,  burst  the  bonds  asunder  that 
confined  his  arms  and  clasped  her  to  his  heart  I" 


In  reading  some  critical  or  pretended  text  books  on 
construction  since  that  time  I  came  across  this  sen- 
tence used  to  illustrate  tautology.  It  was  pointed  out 
that  the  bonds  couldn't  be  "burst"  without  necessarily 
being  asunder.  The  confoundedest  outrages  in  this 
world  are  the  capers  that  precisionists  cut  upon  the 
bodies  of  the  noble  dead.  And  with  impunity  too. 
Think  of  a  village  surveyor  measuring  the  forest  of 
Arden  to  discover  the  exact  acreage!  Or  a  horse- 
doctor  elevating  his  eye-brow  with  a  contemptuous 
smile  and  turning  away,  as  from  an  innocent,  when  you 
speak  of  the  wings  of  that  fine  horse,  Pegasus!  Any 
idiot  knows  that  bonds  couldn't  be  burst  without  being 
burst  asunder.  But,  let  the  impregnable  Jackass 
think — what  would  become  of  the  noble  rhythm  and 
the  majestic  roll  of  sound?  Shakespeare  was  an 
ignorant  dunce  also  when  he  characterized  the  ingrati- 
tude that  involves  the  principle  of  public  honor  as 
"the  unkindest  cut  of  all."  Every  school  child  knows 
that  it  is  ungrammatical;  but  only  those  who  have  any 
sense  learn  after  awhile  the  esoteric  secret  that  it 
sometimes  requires  a  tragedy  of  language  to  provide 
fitting  sacrifice  to  the  manes  of  despair.  There  never 
was  yet  a  man  of  genius  who  wrote  grammatically  and 
under  the  scourge  of  rhetorical  rules.  Anthony 
33 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 


Trollope  is  a  most  perfect  example  of  the  exact  cor- 
rectness that  sterilizes  in  its  own  immaculate  chastity. 
Thackeraj'  would  knock  a  qualifying  adverb  across  the 
street,  or  thrust  it  under  your  nose  to  make  room  for 
the  vivid  force  of  an  idea.  Trollope  would  give  the 
idea  a  decent  funeral  for  the  sake  of  having  his  adverb 
appear  at  the  grave  above  reproach  from  grammatical 
gossip.  Whenever  I  have  risen  from  the  splendid 
psychological  perspective  of  old  Job,  the  solemn  intro- 
spective howls  of  Ecclesiasticus  and  the  generous  living 
philosophy  of  Shakespeare  it  has  always  been  with  the 
desire — of  course  it  is  undignified,  but  it  is  human — 
to  go  and  get  an  English  grammar  for  the  pleasure  of 
spitting  upon  it.  Let  us  be  honest.  I  understand 
everything  about  grammar  except  what  it  means;  but 
if  you  will  give  me  the  living  substance  and  the  proper 
spirit  any  gentleman  who  desires  the  grammatical  rules 
may  have  them,  and  be  hanged  to  him!  And,  while  it 
may  appear  presumptuous,  I  can  conscientiously  say 
that  it  will  not  be  agreeable  to  me  to  settle  down  in 
heaven  with  a  class  of  persons  who  demand  the  rules 
of  grammar  for  the  intellectual  reason  that  corresponds 
to  the  call  for  crutches  by  one-legged  men. 

If  the  foregoing  appear  ill-tempered  pray  forget  it. 
Remember  rather  that  I  have  sought  to  leave  my  friend 
Sir  William  Wallace,  holding  Helen  Mar  on  his  breast 
as  long  as  possible.  And  yet,  I  also  loved  her!  Can 
human  nature  go  farther  than  that? 

"Helen,"  he  said  to  her,  "life's  cord  is  cut  by  God's 
own  hand." 


THE     FIRST     NOVEL 


He  stooped,  he  fell,  and  the  fall  shook  the  scaffold. 
Helen — that  glorified  heroine — raised  his  head  to  her 
lap.  The  noble  Earl  of  Gloucester  stepped  forward, 
took  the  head  in  his  hands. 

"There,"  he  cried  in  a  burst  of  grief,  letting  it  fall 
again  upon  the  insensible  bosom  of  Helen,  "there  broke 
the  noblest  heart  that  ever  beat  in  the  breast  of  man  I" 

That  page  or  two  of  description  I  read  with  difficulty 
and  agony  through  blinding  tears,  and  when  Gloucester 
spoke  his  splendid  eulogy  my  head  fell  on  the  table  and 
I  broke  into  such  wild  sobbing  that  the  little  family 
sprang  up  in  astonishment.  I  could  not  explain  until 
my  mother,  having  led  me  to  my  room,  succeeded  in 
soothing  me  into  calmness  and  I  told  her  the  cause  of  it. 
And  she  saw  me  to  bed  with  sympathetic  caresses  and, 
after  she  left,  it  all  broke  out  afresh  and  I  cried  myself 
to  sleep  in  utter  desolation  and  wretchedness.  Of 
course  the  matter  got  out  and  my  father  began  the 
book.  He  was  sixty  years  old,  not  an  indiscriminate 
reader,  but  a  man  of  kind  and  boyish  heart.  I  felt  a 
sort  of  fascinated  curiosity  to  watch  him  when  he 
reached  the  chapter  that  had  broken  me.  And,  as  if 
it  were  yesterday,  I  can  see  him  under  the  lamplight 
compressing  his  lips,  or  puffing  like  a  smoker  through 
them,  taking  off  his  spectacles,  and  blowing  his  nose 
with  great  ceremony  and  carelessly  allowing  the  hand- 
kerchief to  reach  his  eyes.  Then  another  paragraph 
and  he  would  complain  of  the  glasses  and  wipe  them 
carefully,  also  his  eyes,  and  replace  the  spectacles. 
But  he  never  looked  at  me,  and  when  he  suddenly 
banged  the  lids  together  and,  turning  away,  sat  staring 
35 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 


into  the  fire  with  his  head  bent  forward,  making  un- 
concealed use  of  the  handkerchief,  I  felt  a  sudden 
sympathy  for  him  and  sneaked  out.  He  would  have 
made  a  great  novel  reader  if  he  had  had  the  heart. 
But  he  couldn't  stand  sorrow  and  pain.  The  novel 
reader  must  have  a  heart  for  every  fate.  For  a  week 
or  more  I  read  that  great  chapter  and  its  approaches 
over  and  over,  weeping  less  and  less,  until  I  had  worn 
out  that  first  grief,  and  could  look  with  dry  eyes  upon 
my  dead.  And  never  since  have  I  dared  to  return 
to  it.  Let  who  will  speak  freely  in  other  tones  of 
"Scottish  Chiefs" — opinions  are  sacred  liberties — but 
as  for  me  I  know  it  changed  my  career  from  one  of 
ruthless  piracy  to  better  purposes,  and  certain  boys  of 
my  private  acquaintance  are  introduced  to  Miss  Jane 
Porter  as  soon  as  they  show  similar  bent. 


IV. 

THE  FIRST  NOVEL  TO  READ 

CONTAINING  SOME  SCANDALOUS  REMARKS 
ABOUT    'ROBINSON    CRUSOE" 

'T^HE  very  best  First-Novel-To-Read  in  all  fiction 
is  "Robinson  Crusoe."  There  is  no  dogmatism 
in  the  declaration;  it  is  the  announcement  of  a  fact 
as  well  ascertained  as  the  accuracy  of  the  multiplication 
table.  It  is  one  of  the  delights  of  novel  reading  that 
you  may  have  any  opinion  you  please  and  fire  it  off 
with  confidence,  without  gainsay.  Those  who  differ 
with  you  merely  have  another  opinion,  which  is  not 
sacred  and  cannot  be  proved  any  more  than  yours. 
All  of  the  elements  of  supreme  test  of  imaginative  inter- 
est are  in  "Robinson  Crusoe."  Love  is  absent,  but 
that  is  not  a  test;  love  appeals  to  persons  who  cannot 
read  or  write — it  is  universal,  as  hunger  and  thirst. 

The  book-reading  boy  is  easily  discovered;  you 
always  catch  him  reading  books.  But  the  novel-read- 
ing boy  has  a  system  of  his  own,  a  sort  of  instinctive 
way  of  getting  the  greatest  excitement  out  of  the  story, 
the  very  best  run  for  his  money.  This  sort  of  boy  soon 
learns  to  sit  with  his  feet  drawn  up  on  the  upper  rung 
of  a  chair,  so  that  from  the  knees  to  the  thighs  there  is  a 
gentle  declivity  of  about  thirty  degrees;  the  knees  are 
nicely  separated  that  the  book  may  lie  on  them  without 
37 


THE     DELICIOUS    VICE 


holding.  That  involves  one  of  the  most  cunning  of 
psychological  secrets;  because,  if  the  boy  is  not  a  novel 
reader,  he  does  not  want  the  book  to  lie  open,  since 
every  time  it  closes  he  gains  just  that  much  relief  in 
finding  the  place  again.  The  novel-reading  boy 
knows  the  trick  of  immortal  wisdom ;  he  can  go  through 
the  old  book  cases  and  pick  the  treasures  of  novels  by 
the  way  they  lie  open ;  if  he  gets  hold  of  a  new  or  espec- 
ially fine  edition  of  his  father's  he  need  not  be  told  to 
wrench  it  open  in  the  middle  and  break  the  back  of 
the  binding — he  does  it  instinctively. 

There  are  other  symptons  of  the  born  novel  reader 
to  be  observed  in  him.  If  he  reads  at  night  he  is  careful 
to  so  place  his  chair  that  the  light  will  fall  on  the  page 
from  a  direction  that  will  ultimately  ruin  the  eyes — 
but  it  does  not  interfere  with  the  light.  He  humps 
himself  over  the  open  volume  and  begins  to  display 
that  unerring  curvalinearity  of  the  spine  that  compels 
his  mother  to  study  braces  and  to  fear  that  he  will 
develop  consumption.  Yet  you  can  study  the  world's 
health  records  and  never  find  a  line  to  prove  that  any 
man  with  "occupation  or  profession — novel  reading"  is 
recorded  as  dying  of  consumption.  The  humped-over 
attitude  promotes  compression  of  the  Ivmgs,  telescoping 
of  the  diaphragm,  atrophy  of  the  abdominal  abraca- 
dabra and  other  things  (see  Physiological  Slush, 
p.  179,  et  seq.);  but — it — never — hurts — the — boy! 

To  a  novel  reading  boy  the  position  is  one  of  instinct, 
like  that  of  the  bicycle  racer.  His  eyes  are  strained, 
his  nerves  and  muscles  at  tension — everything  ready 
for  excitement — and  the  book,  lying  open,  leaves  his 
hands  perfectly  free  to  drum  on  the  sides  of  the  chair, 
38 


ROBINSON     CRUSOE 


slap  his  legs  and  knees,  fumble  in  his  pockets  or  even 
scratch  his  head  as  emotion  or  interest  demand.  Does 
anybody  deny  that  the  highest  proof  of  special  genius 
is  the  possession  of  the  instinct  to  adapt  itself  to  the 
matter  in  hand?     Nothing  more  need  be  said. 


Now,  if  you  will  observe  carefully  such  a  boy  when  he 
comes  to  a  certain  point  in  "Robinson  Crusoe"  you 
may  recognize  the  stroke  of  fate  in  his  destiny.  If  he's 
the  right  sort, he  will  read  gayly  along;  he  drums,  he 
slaps  himself,  he  beats  his  breast,  he  scratches  his  head. 
Suddenly  there  will  come  the  shock.  He  is  reading 
rapidly  and  gloriously.  He  finds  his  knife  in  his  pocket, 
as  usual,  and  puts  it  back;  the  top-string  is  there;  he 
drums  the  devil's  tattoo,  he  wets  his  finger  and  smears 
the  margin  of  the  page  as  he  whirls  it  over  and  then — 
he  finds — "The — Print — of — a — Man's — Naked — Foot 
—on— the — Shore!    !    !" 

Oh,  Crackey !  At  this  tremendous  moment  the  novel 
reader  who  has  genius  drums  no  more.  His  hands 
have  seized  the  upper  edges  of  the  muslin  lids,  he  presses 
the  lower  edges  against  his  stomach,  his  back  takes  an 
added  intensity  of  hump,  his  eyes  bulge,  his  heart 
thumps — he  is  landed — landed! 

Terror,  surprise,  sympathy,  hope,  skepticism,  doubt 
— come  all  ye  trooping  emotions  to  threaten  or  console; 
but  an  end  has  come  to  fairy  stories  and  wonder  tales — 
Master  Studious  is  in  the  awful  presence  of  Human 
Nature. 


For  many  years  I  have  believed  that  that  Print — of 
— a — Man's — Naked — Foot  was  set  in  italic  type  in  all 

39 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 


editions  of  "Robinson  Crusoe."  But  a  patient  search 
of  many  editions  has  convinced  me  that  I  must  have 
been  mistaken. 

The  passage  comes  sneaking  along  in  the  midst  of  a 
paragraph  in  common  Roman  letters  and  by  the  living 
jingo!  you  discover  it  just  as  Mr.  Crusoe  discovered  the 
footprint  itself! 

No  story  ever  written  exhibits  so  profoundly  either 
the  perfect  design  of  supreme  genius  or  the  curious 
accidental  result  of  slovenly  carelessness  in  a  hack- 
writer. This  is  not  said  in  any  critical  spirit,  because, 
Robinson  Crusoe,  in  one  sense,  is  above  criticism,  and 
in  another  it  permits  the  freest  analysis  without  suffer- 
ing in  the  estimation  of  any  reader. 

But  for  Robinson  Crusoe,  De  Foe  wpuld  never  have 
ranked  above  the  level  of  his  time.  It  is  customary  for 
critics  to  speak  in  awe  of  the  "Journal  of  the  Plague" 
and  it  is  gravely  recited  that  that  book  deceived  the 
great  Dr.  Meade.  Dr.  Meade  must  have  been  a  poor 
doctor  if  De  Foe's  accuracy  of  description  of  the  symp- 
toms and  effects  of  disease  is  not  vastly  superior  to  the 
detail  he  supplies  as  a  sailor  and  solitaire  upon  a  desert 
island.  I  have  never  been  able  to  finish  the  "Journal." 
The  only  books  in  which  his  descriptions  smack  of 
reality  are  "Moll  Flanders"  and  "Roxana,"  which  will 
barely  stand  reading  these  days. 

In  what  may  be  called  its  literary  manner,  Robinson 
Crusoe  is  entirely  like  the  others.  It  convinces  you  by 
its  own  conviction  of  sincerity.  It  is  simple,  wandering 
yet  direct;  there  is  no  making  of  "points"  or  moving 
to  climaxes.  De  Foe  did  unquestionably  possess  the 
capacity  to  put  into  his  story  the  appearance  of  sin- 
cerity that  persuades  belief  at  a  glance.  In  that  much 
he  had  the  spark  of  genius;  yet  that  same  case  has  not 
availed  to  make  the  "Journal"  of  the  Plague  anything 


ROBINSON     CRUSOE 


more  than  a  curious  and  laborious  conceit,  while  Robin- 
son Crusoe  stands  among  the  first  books  of  the  world — 
a  marvelous  gleam  of  living  interest,  inextinguishably 
fresh  and  heartening  to  the  imagination  of  every  reader 
who  has  sensibility  two  removes  above  a  toad. 

The  question  arises,  then,  is  "Robinson  Crusoe"  the 
calculated  triumph  of  deliberate  genius,  or  the  acci- 
dental stroke  of  a  hack  who  fell  upon  a  golden  sug- 
gestion in  the  account  of  Alexander  Selkirk  and  in- 
creased its  value  ten  thousand  fold  by  an  unintentional 
but  rather  perfect  marshaling  of  incidents  in  order, 
and  by  a  slovenly  ignorance  of  character  treatment 
that  enhanced  the  interest  to  perfect  intensity?  This 
question  may  be  discussed  without  undervaluing  the 
book,  the  extraordinary  merit  of  which  is  shown  in  the 
fact  that,  while  its  idea  has  been  paraphrased,  it  has 
never  been  equalled.  The  "Swiss  Family  Robinson," 
the  "Schonberg-Cotta  Family"  for  children  are  full 
of  merit  and  far  better  and  more  carefully  written,  but 
there  are  only  the  desert  island  and  the  ingenious  shifts 
introduced.  Charles  Reade  in  "Hard  Cash,"  Mr. 
Mallock  in  his  "Nineteenth  Century  Romance," 
Clark  Russel  in  "Marooned,"  and  Mayne  Reid, 
besides  others,  have  used  the  same  theater.  But  only 
in  that  one  great  book  is  the  theater  used  to  display 
the  simple,  yearning,  natural,  resolute,  yet  doubting, 
soul  and  heart  of  man  in  profound  solitude,  awaiting 
in  armed  terror,  but  not  without  purpose,  the  unknown 
and  masked  intentions  of  nature  and  savagery.  It 
seems  to  me — and  I  have  been  tied  to  Crusoe's  chariot 
wheels  for  a  dozen  readings,  I  suppose — that  it  is  the 
pressing  in  upon  your  emotions  of  the  immensity  of  the 
41 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 


great  castaway's  solitude,  in  which  he  appears  like 
some  tremendous  Job  of  abandonment,  fighting  an  un- 
seen world,  which  is  the  innate  note  of  its  power. 


The  very  moment  Friday  becomes  a  loyal  subject, 
the  suspense  relaxes  into  pleased  interest,  and  after 
Friday's  funny  father  and  the  Spaniard  and  others 
appear  it  becomes  a  common  book.  As  for  the  second 
part  of  the  adventures  I  do  not  believe  any  matured 
man  ever  read  it  a  second  time  unless  for  curious  or 
literary  purposes.  If  he  did  he  must  be  one  of  that 
curious  but  simple  family  that  have  read  the  second 
part  of  "Faust,"  "Paradise  Regained,"  and  the 
"Odyssey,"  and  who  now  peruse  "Clarissa  Harlowe" 
and  go  carefully  over  the  catalogue  of  ships  in  the 
"Iliad"  as  a  preparation  for  enjoying  the  excitements 
of  the  city  directory. 

Every  particle  of  greatness  in  "Robinson  Crusoe"  is 
compressed  within  two  himdred  pages,  the  other  four 
hundred  being  about  as  mediocre  trash  as  you  could 
purchase  anywhere  between  cloth  lids. 


It  is  interesting  to  apply  subjective  analysis  to 
Robinson  Crusoe.  The  book  in  its  very  greatness  has 
turned  more  critical  swans  into  geese  than  almost  any 
other.  They  have  praised  the  marvelous  ingenuity 
with  which  De  Foe  described  how  the  castaway  over- 
came single-handed,  the  deprivations  of  all  civilized 
conveniences;  they  have  marveled  at  the  simple  method 
in  which  all  his  labors  are  marshaled  so  as  to  render 
his  conversion  of  the  island  into  a  home  the  type  of 
industrial  and  even  of  social  progress  and  theory ;  they 
have  rhapsodized  over  the  perfection  of  De  Foe's  style 

42 


ROBINSON     CRUSOE 


as  a  model  of  literary  strength  and  artistic  veri- 
semblance.  Only  a  short  time  ago  a  mighty  critic  of 
a  great  London  paper  said  seriously  that  "Robinson 
Crusoe  and  Gulliver  appeal  infinitely  more  to  the 
literary  reader  than  to  the  boy,  who  does  not  want  a 
classic  but  a  book  written  by  a  contemporary."  What 
an  extraordinary  boy  that  must  be!  It  is  probable 
that  few  boys  care  for  Gulliver  beyond  his  adventures 
in  Lilliput  and  Brobdignag,  but  they  devour  that 
much,  together  with  Robinson  Crusoe,  with  just  as 
much  avidity  now  as  they  did  a  century  ago.  Your 
clear-headed,  healthy  boy  is  the  first  best  critic  of  what 
constitutes  the  very  liver  and  lights  of  a  novel.  Nothing 
but  the  primitive  problems  of  courage  meeting  peril, 
virtue  meeting  vice,  love,  hatred,  ambition  for  power 
and  glory,  will  go  down  with  him.  The  grown  man 
is  more  capable  of  dealing  with  social  subtleties  and 
the  problems  of  conscience,  but  those  sorts  of  books  do 
not  last  unless  they  have  also  "action — action — 
action." 

Will  the  New  Zealander,  sitting  amidst  the  prophetic 
ruins  of  St.  Paul's,  invite  his  soul  reading  Robert 
Elsmere?  Of  course  you  can't  say  what  a  New 
Zealander  of  that  period  might  actually  do;  but  what 
would  you  think  of  him  if  you  caught  him  at  it?  The 
greatest  stories  of  the  world  are  the  Bible  stories,  and 
I  never  saw  a  boy — intractable  of  acquiring  the  Sunday- 
school  habit  though  he  may  have  been — who  wouldn't 
lay  his  savage  head  on  his  paws  and  quietly  listen  to 
the  good  old  tales  of  wonder  out  of  that  book  of 
treasures. 


So  let  us  look  into  the  interior  of  our  faithful  old 
friend,  Robinson  Crusoe,  and  examine  his  composition 

43 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 


as  a  literary  whole.  From  the  moment  that  Crusoe 
is  washed  ashore  on  the  island  until  after  the  release 
of  Friday's  father  and  the  Spaniard  from  the  hands  of 
the  cannibals,  there  is  no  book  in  print,  perhaps,  that 
can  surpass  it  in  interest  and  the  strained  impression 
it  makes  upon  the  unsophisticated  mind.  It  is  all 
comprised  in  about  200  pages,  but  to  a  boy  to  whom 
the  world  is  a  theater  of  crowded  action,  to  whom 
everything  seems  to  have  come  ready-made,  to  whom 
the  necessity  of  obedience  and  accommodation  to 
others  has  been  conveyed  by  constant  friction — here  he 
finds  himself  for  the  first  time  face  to  face  with  the 
problem  of  solitude.  He  can  appreciate  the  danger 
from  wild  animals,  genii,  ghosts,  battles,  sieges  and 
sudden  death,  but  in  no  other  book  before,  did  he  ever 
come  upon  a  human  being  left  solitary,  with  all  these 
possible  dangers  to  face. 

The  voyages  on  the  raft,  the  house-building,  con- 
triving, fearing,  praying,  arguing — all  these  are  full  of 
plaintive  pathos  and  yet  of  encouragement.  He  wit- 
nesses despair  turned  into  comfortable  resignation 
as  the  result  of  industry.  It  has  required  about 
twelve  years.  Virtue  is  apparently  fattening 
upon  its  own  reward,  when — Smash!  Bang! — our 
young  reader  runs  upon  "the — print — of — a — man's — 
naked — foot!"  and  security  and  happiness,  like  startled 
birds,  are  flown  forever.  For  twelve  more  years  this 
new  unseen  terror  hangs  over  the  poor  solitary.  Then 
we  have  Friday,  the  funny  cannibals  later  and  it  is  all 
over.  But  the  vast  solitude  of  that  poor  castaway  has 
entered  the  imagination  of  the  youth  and  dominates 
it. 

These  two  hundred  pages  are  crowded  with  sug- 
gestions that  set  a  boy's  mind  on  fire,  yet  every  page 
contains   evidence   of  obvious   slovenliness,    indolence 

44 


ROBINSON     CRUSOE 


and  ignorance  of  human  nature  and  common  things, 
half  of  which  faults  seem  directly  to  contribute  to  the 
result,  while  the  other  half  are  never  noticed  by  the 
reader. 

How  many  of  you,  who  sniff  at  this,  know  Crusoe's 
real  name?  Yet  it  stares  right  out  of  the  very  first 
paragraphs  in  the  book — a  clean,  perhaps  accidental, 
proof  of  good  scholarship,  which  De  Foe  possessed. 
Crusoe  tells  us  his  father  was  a  German  from  Bremen, 
who  married  an  Englishwoman,  from  whose  family 
name  of  Robinson  came  the  son's  name  which  was 
properly  Robinson  Kreutznaer.  This  latter  name,  he 
explains,  became  corrupted  in  the  common  English 
speech  into  Crusoe.  That  is  an  excellent  touch.  The 
German  pronunciation  of  Kreutznaer  would  sound  like 
Krites-nare,  and  a  mere  dry  scholar  would  have 
evolved  Crysoe  out  of  the  name.  But  the  English- 
speaking  people  everywhere,  until  within  the  past 
twenty  years  or  so,  have  given  the  German  "eu"  the 
sound  of  "oo"  or  "u."  Robinson's  father  therefore 
was  called  Crootsner  until  it  was  shaved  into  Crootsno 
and  thence  smoothed  to  Crusoe. 

But  what  was  the  Christian  name  of  the  elder  Kreutz- 
naer? Or  of  the  boy's  mother?  Or  of  his  brothers  or 
sisters?  Or  of  the  first  ship  captain  under  whom  he 
sailed;  or  any  of  them;  or  even  of  the  ship  he  com- 
manded, and  in  which  he  was  wrecked;  or  of  the  dog 
that  he  carried  to  the  island;  or  of  the  two  cats;  or  of 
the  first  and  all  the  other  tame  goats;  or  of  the  inlet; 
or  of  Friday's  father;  or  of  the  Spaniard  he  saved;  or 
of  the  ship  captain;  or  of  the  ship  that  finally  saved 
him?     Who  knows?     The  book  is  a  desert  as  far  as 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 


nomenclature  goes — the  only  blossoms  being  his  own 
name;  that  of  Wells,  a  Brazilian  neighbor;  Xury,  the 
Moorish  boy;  Friday;  Poll,  the  parrot;  and  Will  Atkins. 


You  may  retort  that  all  this  doesn't  matter.  That  is 
very  true — and  be  hanged  to  you! — but  those  facts 
prove  by  every  canon  of  literary  art  that  Robinson 
Crusoe  is  either  a  coldly  calculated  flight  of  con- 
summate genius  or  an  accidental  freak  of  hack  litera- 
ture. When  De  Foe  wrote,  it  was  only  a  century  after 
Drake  and  his  companions  in  authorized  piracy  had 
made  the  British  privateer  the  scourge  of  the  seas  and 
had  demonstrated  that  naval  supremacy  meant  the 
control  of  the  world.  The  seafaring  life  was  one  of 
peril,  but  it  carried  with  it  honor,  glory  and  envy. 
Forty  years  later  Nelson  was  born  to  crown  British 
navalry  with  deathless  Glory.  Even  the  commonest 
sailor  spoke  his  ship's  name — if  it  were  a  fine  vessel — 
with  the  same  affection  that  he  spoke  his  wife's  and 
cursed  a  bad  ship  by  its  name  as  if  to  tag  its  vileness 
with  proverbiality. 

When  De  Foe  wrote  Alexander  Selkirk,  able  seaman, 
was  alive  and  had  told  his  story  of  shipwreck  to  Sir 
Richard  Steele,  editor  of  the  English  Gentleman  and 
of  the  Tattler,  who  wrote  it  up  well — but  not  half  as 
well  as  any  one  of  ten  thousand  newspaper  men  of 
today  could  do  under  similar  circumstances. 

Now  who  that  has  read  of  Selkirk  and  Dampierre 
and  Stradling  does  not  remember  the  two  famous 
ships,  the  "Cinque  Ports"  and  the  "St.  George?" 
In  every  actual  book  of  the  times,  ship's  names  were 
sprinkled  over  the  page  as  if  they  had  been  shaken  out 
of  the  pepper  box.  But  you  inquire  in  vain  the  name 
of  the  slaver  that  wrecked  "poor  Robinson  Crusoe" — 

46 


ROBINSON     CRUSOE 


a  name  that  would  have  been  printed  on  his  memory 
beyond  forgetting  because  of  the  very  misfortune 
itself.  Now  the  book  is  the  autobiography  of  a  man 
whose  only  years  of  active  life  between  eighteen 
and  twenty-six  were  passed  as  a  sailor.  It 
was  written  apparently  after  he  was  seventy-two  years 
old,  at  the  period  when  every  trifling  incident  and 
name  of  youth  would  survive  most  brightly;  yet  he 
names  no  ships,  no  sailor  mates,  carefully  avoids  all 
knowledge  of  or  advantage  attaching  to  any  parts  of 
ships.  It  is  out  of  character  as  a  sailor's  tale,  showing 
that  the  author  either  did  not  understand  the  value  of 
or  was  too  indolent  to  acquire  the  ship  knowledge  that 
would  give  to  his  work  the  natural  smell  of  salt  water 
and  the  bilge.     It  is  a  landlubber's  sea  yarn. 

Is  it  in  character  as  a  revelation  of  human  nature? 
No  man  like  unto  Robinson  Crusoe  ever  did  live,  does 
live,  or  ever  will  live,  unless  as  a  freak  deprived  of 
human  emotions.  The  Robinson  Crusoe  of  Despair 
Island  was  not  a  castaway,  but  the  mature  politician. 
Daniel  Defoe  of  Newgate  Prison.  The  castaway 
would  have  melted  into  loving  recollections;  the  im- 
prisoned lampoonist  would  have  busied  himself  with 
schemes,  ideas,  arguments  and  combinations  for  getting 
out,  and  getting  on.  This  poor  Robin  on  the  island 
weeps  over  nothing  but  his  own  sorrows,  and,  while 
pretending  to  bewail  his  solitude,  turns  aside  coldly 
from  companionships  next  only  in  affection  to  those  of 
men.  He  has  a  dog,  two  ship's  cats  (of  whose  "eminent 
history"  he  promises  something  that  is  never  related), 
tame  goats  and  parrots.  He  gives  none  of  them  a 
name,  he  does  not  occupy  his  yearning  for  companion- 
ship and  love  by  preparing  comforts  for  them  or  by 
teaching  them  tricks  of  intelligence  or  amusement; 
and  when  he  does  make  a  stagger  at  teaching  Poll  to 

47 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 


talk  it  is  for  the  sole  purpose  of  hearing  her  repeat 
"Poor  Robin  Crusoe  1"  The  dog  is  dragged  in  to  work 
for  him,  but  not  to  be  rewarded.  He  dies  without 
notice,  as  do  the  cats,  and  not  even  a  billet  of  wood 
marks  their  graves. 

Could  any  being,  with  a  drop  of  human  blood  in  his 
veins,  do  that?  He  thinks  of  his  father  with  tears  in 
his  eyes — because  he  did  not  escape  the  present  soli- 
tude by  taking  the  old  man's  advice!  Does  he  recall 
his  mother  or  any  of  the  childish  things  that  lie  so  long 
and  deep  in  the  heart  of  every  natural  man?  Does  he 
ever  wonder  what  his  old  school -fellows,  Bob  Freckles 
and  Pete  Baker,  are  doing  these  solitary  evenings  when 
he  sits  under  the  tropics  and  hopes — could  he  not  at 
least  hope  it? — that  they  are,  thank  God,  alive  and 
happy  at  York?  He  discourses  like  a  parson  of  the 
utterly  impossible  affection  that  Friday  had  for  his 
cannibal  sire  and  tells  you  how  noble,  Christian  and 
beautiful  it  was — as  if,  by  Jove !  a  little  of  that  virtue 
wouldn't  have  ornamented  his  own  cold,  emotionless, 
fishy  heart! 

He  had  no  sentimental  side.  Think  of  those  dreary, 
egotistic,  awful  evenings,  when,  for  more  than  twenty 
years  this  infernal  hypocrite  kept  himself  company 
and  tried  patiently  to  deceive  God  by  flattering  Him 
about  religion!  It  is  impossible.  Why  thought 
turns  as  certainly  to  revery  and  recollection  as  grass 
turns  to  seed.  He  married.  What  was  his  wife's 
name?  We  know  how  much  property  she  had.  What 
were  the  names  of  the  honest  Portuguese  Captain  and 
the  London  woman  who  kept  his  money?  The  cold 
48 


ROBINSON     CRUSOE 


selfishness  and  gloomy  egotism  of  this  creature  mark 
him  as  a  monster  and  not  as  a  man. 


So  the  book  is  not  in  character  as  an  autobiography, 
nor  does  it  contain  a  single  softening  emotion  to  create 
sympathy.  Let  us  see  whether  it  be  scholarly  in  its 
ease.  The  one  line  that  strikes  like  a  bolt  of  lightning 
is  the  height  of  absurdity.  We  have  all  laughed, 
afterward  of  course,  at  that — single — naked — foot — 
print.  It  could  not  have  been  there  without  others, 
unless  Friday  were  a  one  legged  man,  or  was  playing 
the  good  old  Scots  game  of  "hop-scotch!" 

But  the  foot-print  is  not  a  circumstance  to  the 
cannibals.  All  the  stage  burlesques  of  Robinson 
Crusoe  combined  could  not  produce  such  funny 
cannibals  as  he  discovered.  Crusoe's  cannibals  ate 
no  flesh  but  that  of  men!  He  had  no  great  trouble 
contriving  how  to  induce  Friday  to  eat  goat's  flesh! 
They  took  all  the  trouble  to  come  to  his  island  to  indulge 
in  picnics,  during  which  they  ate  up  folks,  danced  and 
then  went  home  before  night.  When  the  big  party  of 
31  arrived,  they  had  with  them  one  other  cannibal  of 
Friday's  tribe,  a  Spaniard,  and  Friday's  father.  It 
appears  they  always  carefully  unbound  a  victim  before 
despatching  him.  They  brought  Friday  pere  for 
lunch,  although  he  was  old,  decrepit  and  thin — a 
condition  that  always  unfits  a  man  among  all  known 
cannibals  for  serving  as  food.  They  reject  them  as 
we  do  stringy  old  roosters  for  spring  chickens  in 
the  best  society.  Then  Friday,  born  a  cannibal  and 
converted  to  Crusoe's  peculiar  religion,  shows  that  in 
three  years  he  has  acquired  all  the  emotions  of  filial 
affection  prevalent  at  that  time  among  Yorkshire  folk 
who    attended    dissenting    chapels.     More    wonderful 

49 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 


still!  old  Friday  pere,  immersed  in  age  and  cannibal- 
ism, has  the  corresponding  paternal  feeling.  Crusoe 
never  says  exactly  where  these  cannibals  came  from, 
but  my  own  belief  is  that  they  came  from  that  little 
Swiss  town  whence  the  little  wooden  animals  for  toy 
Noah's  Arks  also  came. 

A  German  savant — one  of  the  patient  sort  that  spend 
half  a  life  writing  a  monograph  on  the  variation  of 
spots  on  the  butterfly's  wings — could  get  a  philosoph- 
ical dissertation  on  Doubt  out  of  Crusoe's  troubles 
with  pens,  ink  and  paper;  also  clothes.  In  the  volume 
I  am  using,  on  page  86,  third  paragraph,  he  says:  "I 
should  lose  my  reckoning  of  time  for  want  of  books, 
and  pen  and  ink."  So  he  kept  it  by  notches  in  wood, 
he  tells  in  the  fourth  paragraph.  In  paragraph  5, 
same  page,  he  says:  "We  are  to  observe  that  among 
the  many  things  I  brought  out  of  the  ship  *  *  * 
I  got  several  of  less  value,  etc.,  which  I  omitted  setting 
down  as  in  particular  pens,  ink  and  paper  I"  Same 
paragraph,  lower  down:  "I  shall  show  that  while  my 
ink  lasted  I  kept  things  very  exact,  but  after  that  was 
gone  I  could  not  make  any  ink  by  any  means  that  I 
could  devise."  Page  87,  second  paragraph:  "I  wanted 
many  things,  notwithstanding  all  the  many  things 
that  I  had  amassed  together,  and  of  these  ink  was  one!" 
Page  88,  first  paragraph:  "I  drew  up  my  affairs  in 
writing!"  Now,  by  George!  did  you  ever  hear  of 
more  appearing  and  disappearing  pens,  ink  and  paper? 

The  adventures  of  his  clothes  were  as  remarkable 

as  his  own.     On  his  very  first  trip  to  the  wreck,  after 

landing,  he  went  "rummaging  for  clothes,  of  which  I 

found  enough,"  but  took  no  more  than  he  wanted  for 

50 


ROBINSON     CRUSOE 


present  use.  On  the  second  trip  he  "took  all  the  men's 
clothes"  (and  there  were  fifteen  souls  on  board  when 
she  sailed).  Yet  in  his  famous  debit  and  credit  calcu- 
lations between  good  and  evil  he  sets  these  down, 
page  88: 


EVIL 


GOOD 


I  have  no  clothes  to  But  I  am  in  a  hot  cli- 
cover  me.  mate,    where,    if    I    had 

clothes  (1)  I  could  hardly 
wear  them. 

On  page  147,  bewailing  his  lack  of  a  sieve,  he  says: 
"Linen,  I  had  none  but  what  was  mere  rags." 

Page  158  (one  year  later):  "My  clothes,  too,  began 
to  decay;  as  to  linen,  I  had  had  none  a  good  while, 
except  some  checkered  shirts,  which  I  carefully  pre- 
served, because  many  times  I  could  bear  no  other 
clothes  on.  I  had  almost  three  dozen  of  shirts,  several 
thick  watch  coats,  too  hot  to  wear." 

So  he  tried  to  make  jackets  out  of  the  watch  coats. 
Then  this  ingenious  gentleman,  who  had  nothing  to 
wear  and  was  glad  of  it  on  account  of  the  heat,  which 
kept  him  from  wearing  anything  but  a  shirt,  and  ren- 
dered watch  coats  unendurable,  actually  made  him- 
self a  coat,  waistcoat,  breeches,  cap  and  umbrella  of 
skins  with  the  hair  on  and  wore  them  in  great  comfort! 
Page  175  he  goes  hunting,  wearing  this  suit,  belted  by 
two  heavy  skin  belts,  carrying  hatchet,  saw,  powder, 
shot,  his  heavy  fowling  piece  and  the  goatskin  umbrella 
— total  weight  of  baggage  and  clothes  about  ninety 
pounds.     It  must  have  been  a  cold  day  I 

Yet  the  first  thing  he  does  for  the  naked  Friday 
thirteen  years  later  is  to  give  him  a  pair — of — LINEN 
— trousers! 


51 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 


Poor  Robin  Crusoe — what  a  colossal  liar  was  wasted 
on  a  desert  island! 


Of  course,  no  boy  sees  the  blemishes  in  "Robinson 
Crusoe;"  those  are  left  to  the  Infallible  Critic.  The 
book  is  as  ludicrous  as  "Hamlet"  from  one  aspect  and 
as  profound  as  "Don  Quixote"  from  another.  In  its 
pages  the  wonder  tales  and  wonder  facts  meet  and 
resolve;  realism  and  idealism  are  joined — above  all, 
there  is  a  mystery  no  critic  may  solve.  It  is  useless 
to  criticize  genius  or  a  miracle,  except  to  increase  its 
wonder.  Who  remembers  anything  in  "Crusoe"  but 
the  touch  of  the  wizard's  hand?  Who  associates  the 
Duke  of  Athens,  Hermia  and  Helena,  with  Bottom  and 
Snug,  Titania,  Oberon  and  Puck?  Any  literary 
master  mechanic  might  real  off  ten  thousand  yards  of 
the  Greek  folks  or  of  "Pericles,"  but  when  you  want 
something  that  runs  thus: 

"I  knov/  a  bank  whereon  the  wild  thyme  blows! 

Where  oxlip  and  the  nodding  violet  grows — ." 
why,  then,  my  masters,  you  must  put  up  the  price  and 
employ  a  genius  to  work  the  miracle. 

Take  all  miracles  without  question.  Whether  work 
of  genius  or  miracle  of  accident,  "Robinson  Crusoe" 
gives  you  a  generous  run  for  your  money. 


52 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 

(Second  Series) 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 


V 

THE  OPEN  POLAR  SEA  OF  NOVELS 

WITH     HIGHLY     INCENDIARY     ADVICE     TO 
BOYS  AND  SOME  MORE  AN- 
CIENT HISTORY 

AFTER  the  first  novel  has  been  read,  some- 
AA  where  under  the  seasoned  age  of  fourteen 
years,  the  beginner  equipped  with  inherent 
genius  for  novel  reading  is  afloat  upon  an  open  sea 
of  literature,  a  master  mariner  of  his  own  craft,  hav- 
ing ports  to  make,  to  leave,  to  take,  so  splendid  of 
variety  and  wonder  as  to  make  the  voyages  of  Sin- 
bad  sing  small  by  comparison.  It  may  be  proper 
and  even  a  duty  here  to  suggest  to  the  young  novel 
reader  that  the  Ten  Commandments  and  all  govern- 
mental statutes  authorize  the  instant  killing,  without 
pity  or  remorse,  of  any  heavy-headed  and  intrusive 
person  who  presumes  to  map  out  for  him  a  symmet- 
rical and  well-digested  course  of  novel  reading.  The 
murder  of  such  folks  is  universally  excused  as  self- 
defense  and  secretly  applauded  as  a  public  service. 
The  born  novel  reader  needs  no  guide,  counsellor  or 
friend.  He  is  his  own  "master."  He  can  with  per- 
fect safety  and  indescribable  delight  shut  his  eyes, 
reach  out  his  hand,  pull  down  any  plum  of  a  book 
and  never  make  a  mistake.  Novel  reading  is  the  only 
one  of  the  splendid  occupations  of  life  calling  for 
no  instruction  or  advice.  All  that  is  necessary  is  to 
bite  the  apple  with  the  largest   freedom  possible  to 

55 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 

the  intellectual  and  imaginative  jaws,  and  let  the 
taste  of  it  squander  itself  all  the  way  down  from  the 
front  teeth  until  it  is  lost  in  the  digestive  joys  of 
memory.  There  is  no  miserable  quail  limit  to  novels 
— you  can  read  thirty  novels  in  thirty  days  or  365 
novels  in  365  days  for  thirty  years,  and  the  last  one 
will  always  have  the  delicious  taste  of  the  pies  of 
childhood. 

If  any  honest-minded  boy  chances  to  read  these 
lines,  let  him  charge  his  mind  with  full  contempt  for 
any  misguided  elders  who  have  designs  of  "choosing 
only  the  best  accepted  novels"  for  his  reading. 
There  are  no  "best"  novels  except  by  the  grace  of 
the  poor  ones,  and,  if  you  don't  read  the  poor  ones, 
the  "best"  will  be  as  tasteless  as  unsalted  rice.  I 
say  to  boys  that  are  worth  growing  up:  don't  let  any- 
body give  you  patronizing  advice  about  novels.  If 
your  pastors  and  masters  try  oppression,  there  is 
the  orchard,  the  creek  bank,  the  attic  room,  the  roof 
of  the  woodshed  (under  the  peach  tree),  and  a  thous- 
and other  places  where  you  may  hide  and  maintain 
your  natural  independence.  Don't  let  elderly  and 
officious  persons  explain  novels  to  you.  They  can 
not  honestly  do  so;  so  don't  waste  time.  Every  boy 
of  fourteen,  with  the  genius  to  read  'em,  is  just  as 
good  a  judge  of  novels  and  can  understand  them 
quite  as  well  as  any  gentleman  of  brains  of  any  old 
age.     Because  novels  mean  entirely  different  things 

to  every  blessed  reader. 

*   *   * 

The  main  thing  at  the  beginning  is  to  be  in  the 
neighborhood  of  a  good  "novel  orchard"  and  to  nib- 
ble and  eat,  and  even  "gormandize,"  as  your  fancy 
leads  you.  Only — as  you  value  your  soul  and  your 
honor  as  a  gentleman — bear  in  mind  that  what  you 

56 


THE     OPEN     POLAR     SEA 

read  in  every  novel  that  pleases  you  is  sacred  truth. 
There  are  busy-bodies,  pretenders  to  "culture,"  and 
sticklers  for  the  multiplication  table  and  Euclid's 
pestiferous  theorem,  who  will  tell  you  that  novel 
reading  is  merely  for  entertainment  and  light  ac- 
complishment, and  that  the  histories  of  fiction  are 
purely  imaginary  and  not  to  be  taken  seriously. 
That  is  pure  falsehood.  The  truth  of  all  humanity, 
as  well  as  all  its  untruth,  flows  in  a  noble  stream 
through  the  pages  of  fiction.  Do  not  allow  the 
elders  to  persuade  you  that  pirate  stories,  battles, 
sieges,  murders  and  sudden  deaths,  the  road  to 
transgression  and  the  face  of  dishonesty  are  not 
good  for  you.  They  are  90  per  cent,  pure  nutri- 
ment to  a  healthy  boy's  mind,  and  any  other  sort 
of  boy  ought  particularly  to  read  them  and  so  learn 
the  shortest  cut  to  the  penitentiary  for  the  good  of 
the  world.  Whenever  you  get  hold  of  a  novel  that 
preaches  and  preaches  and  preaches,  and  can't  give 
a  poor  ticket-of-leave  man  or  the  decentest  sort  of 
a  villain  credit  for  one  good  trait — Gee,  Whizz!  how 
tiresome  they  are — lose  it,  you  young  scamp,  at  once, 
if  you  respect  yourself.  If  you  are  pushed  you  can 
say  that  Bill  Jones  took  it  away  from  you  and  threw 
it  in  the  creek.  The  great  Victor  Hugo  and  the 
authors  of  that  noble  drama  "The  Two  Orphans," 
are  my  authorities  for  the  statement  that  some  fibs 
— not  all  fibs,  but  some  proper  fibs — are  entered  in 
heaven  on  both  debit  and  credit  sides  of  the  book  of 
fate. 

There  is  one  book,  the  Book  of  Books,  swelling 
rich  and  full  with  the  wisdom  and  beauty  and  joy 
and  sorrow  of  humanity  —  a  book  that  set  humility 
like  a  diamond  in  the  forehead  of  virtue;  that  found 
mercy  and  charity  outcasts  among  the  minds  of  men 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 

and  left  them  radiant  queens  in  the  world's  heart; 
that  stickled  not  to  describe  the  gorgeous  esotery  of 
corroding  passion  and  shamed  it  with  the  purity  of 
Mary  Magdelen;  that  dragged  from  the  despair  of 
old  Job  the  uttermost  poison-drop  of  doubt  and  an- 
swered it  with  the  noble  problem  of  organized  ex- 
istence; that  teems  with  murder  and  mistake  and 
glows  with  all  goodness  and  honest  aspiration — that 
is  the  Book  of  Books.  There  hasn't  been  one  writ- 
ten since  that  has  crossed  the  boundary  of  its  scope. 
What  would  that  book  be  after  some  goody-goody 
had  expurgated  it  of  evil  and  left  it  sterilized  in  but- 
ter and  sugar?  Let  no  ignorant  paternal  Czar,  rul- 
ing over  cottage  or  mansion,  presume  to  keep  from 
the  mind  and  heart  of  youth  the  vigorous  knowl- 
edge and  observation  of  evil  and  good,  crime  and 
virtue  together.  No  chaff,  no  wheat;  no  dross,  no 
gold;  no  human  faults  and  weaknesses,  no  heavenly 
hope.  And  if  any  gentleman  does  not  like  the  senti- 
ment, he  can  find  me  at  my  usual  place  of  residence, 
unless  he  intends  violence — and  be  hanged,  also,  to 

him  I 

*    *    * 

A  novel  is  a  novel,  and  there  are  no  bad  ones  in 
the  world,  except  those  you  do  not  happen  to  like. 
Suppose  a  boy  started  with  Robinson  Crusoe  and 
was  scientifically  and  criminally  steered  by  the  hand 
of  misguided  "culture"  to  Scott  and  Dickens  and 
Cooper  and  Hawthorne — all  the  classics,  in  fact, 
so  that  he  would  escape  the  vulgar  thousands? 
Answer  a  straight  question,  ye  old  rooters  between  a 
thousand  miles  of  muslin  lids — would  you  have  been 
willing  to  miss  "The  Gunmaker  of  Moscow"  back 
yonder  in  the  green  days  of  say  forty  years  ago? 
What  do  you  think  of  Prof.  William  Henry  Peck's 

58 


THE     OPEN     POLAR     SEA 

"Cryptogram?"  Were  not  Sylvanus  Cobb,  Jr.,  and 
Emerson  Bennett  authors  of  renown — honor  to  their 
dust,  wherever  it  lies!  Didn't  you  read  Mrs.  South- 
worth's  "Capitola"  or  the  "Hidden  Hand  "  long  be- 
fore "Vashti"  was  dreamed  of?  Don't  you  remem- 
ber that  No.  52  of  Beadle's  Dime  Library  (light 
yellowish  red  paper  covers)  was  "Silverheels,  the 
Delaware,"  and  that  No.  77  was  "Schinderhannes, 
the  Outlaw  of  the  Black  Forest?"  I  yield  to  no  man 
in  affection  and  reverence  for  M.  Dumas,  Mr.  Thack- 
eray and  others  of  the  higher  circles,  but  what's  the 
matter  with  Ned  Buntline,  honest,  breezy,  vigorous, 
swinging  old  Ned?  Put  the  "Three  Guardsmen" 
where  you  will,  but  there  is  also  room  for  "Buffalo 
Bill,  the  Scout."  When  I  first  saw  Col.  Cody,  an 
ornament  to  the  theatre  and  a  painful  trial  to  the 
drama,  and  realized  that  he  was  Buffalo  Bill  in  the 
flesh — why,  I  was  glad  I  had  also  read  "Buffalo  Bill's 
Last  Shot" — (may  he  never  shoot  it).  The  day  has 
passed  forever,  probably,  when  Buffalo  Bill  shall 
shout  to  his  other  scouts,  "You  set  fire  to  the  girl 
while  I  take  care  of  the  house!"  or  vice  versa,  and 
so  saying,  bear  the  fainting  heroine  triumphantly  off 
from  the  treacherous  redskins.  But  the  story  has 
lived. 


It  was  a  happy  and  honored  custom  in  the  old  days 
for  subscribers  to  the  New  York  Ledger  and  the 
New  York  Weekly  to  unite  in  requests  for  the  serial 
republication  of  favorite  stories  in  those  great  fire- 
side luminaries.  They  were  the  old-fashioned, 
broadside  sheets  and,  of  course,  there  were  insuper- 
able difficulties  against  preserving  the  numbers. 
After  a  year  or  two,  therefore,  there  would  awaken 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 

a  general  hunger  among  the  loyal  hosts  to  "read  the 
story  over,"  and  when  the  demand  was  sufficiently 
strong  the  publishers  would  repeat  it,  cuts,  divisions, 
and  all,  just  as  at  first.  How  many  times  the  "Gun- 
maker  of  Moscow"  was  repeated  in  the  Ledger, 
heaven  knows.  I  remember  I  petitioned  repeatedly 
for  "Buffalo  Bill"  in  the  Weekly,  and  we  got  it,  too, 
and  waded  through  it  again.  By  wading,  I  don't 
mean  pushing  laboriously  and  tediously  through,  but, 
by  George!  half  immersion  in  the  joy.  It  was  a 
week  between  numbers,  and  a  studious  and  appre- 
ciative boy  made  no  bones  of  reading  the  current 
weekly  chapters  half  a  dozen  times  over  while  wait- 
ing for  the  next. 

It  must  have  been  ten  years  later  that  I  felt  a 
thrill  at  the  coming  of  Buffalo  Bill  himself  in  his 
first  play.  I  had  risen  to  the  dignity  of  dramatic 
critic  upon  a  journal  of  limited  civilization  and 
boundless  politics,  and  was  privileged  to  go  behind 
the  scenes  at  the  theatre  and  actually  speak  to  the 
actors.  (I  interviewed  Mary  Anderson  during  her 
first  season,  in  the  parlor  of  the  local  hotel,  where 
honest  George  Bristow — who  kept  the  cigar  stand 
and  could  not  keep  a  healthy  appetite — always  gave 
a  Thanksgiving  order  for  "two-whole-roast  turkeys 
and  a  piece  of  breast,"  and  they  were  served,  too, 
the  whole  ones  going  to  some  near-by  hospital,  and 
the  piece  of  breast  to  George's  honest  stomach — 
good,  kind  soul  that  he  was.  And  Miss  Anderson 
chewed  gum  during  the  whole  period  of  the  inter- 
view to  the  intense  amusement  of  my  elder  and 
brother  dramatic  critic,  who  has  since  become  the 
honored  governor  of  his  adopted  state,  and  toward 
whom  I  beg  to  look  with  affectionate  memory  of 
those  days.) 


THE     OPEN     POLAR     SEA 


Now,  when  a  man  has  known  novels  intimately, 
has  been  dramatic  critic,  and  has  traveled  with  a 
circus,  it  seems  to  me  in  all  reason  he  can  not  fairly 
have  any  other  earthly  joys  to  desire.  At  fifteen  I 
was  walking  on  tip-toe  about  the  house  on  Sundays, 
and  going  off  to  the  end  of  the  garden  to  softly 
whistle  "weekday"  tunes,  and  at  twenty  I  stood  off 
the  wings  L.  U.  E.,  and  had  twenty  "Black  Crook" 
coryphees  in  silk  tights  and  tarletan  squeeze  past 
in  line,  and  nod  and  say,  "Is  it  going  all  right  in 
front?"  They — knew — I — was — the — Critic!  When 
you  can  do  that  you  can  laugh  at  Byron,  roosting 
around  upon  inaccessible  mountain  crags  and  formu- 
lating solitude  and  indigestion  into  poetry! 

I  waited  for  Buffalo  Bill's  coming  with  feelings 
that  can  not  be  described.  It  was  impossible  to  ex- 
pect to  meet  Sir  William  Wallace  in  the  flesh,  or  Sir 
Wilfred  of  Ivanhoe,  or  Capt.  D'Artagnan,  or  Um- 
slopogaas,  or  any  one  of  a  thousand  great  fighting 
heroes;  but  here  was  Buffalo  Bill,  just  as  great  and 
glorious  and  dashing  and  handsome  as  any  of  them, 
and  my  right  hand  tingled  to  be  grasped  in  that  of 
the  Bayard  of  the  Prairies.  And  that  hand's  desire 
was  attained.  In  his  dressing-room  between  acts  I 
sat  nervously  on  a  chair  while  the  splendid  Apollo 
of  frontiersmen,  in  buckskin  and  beads,  sat  on  his 
trunk,  with  his  long,  shapely  legs  sprawled  grace- 
fully out,  his  head  thrown  back  so  that  the  mane  of 
brown  hair  should  hang  behind.  It  was  glistening 
with  oil  and  redolent  of  barber's  perfume.  And  we 
talked  there  as  one  man  to  another,  each  apparently 
without  fear.  I  was  certainly  nervous  and  timid, 
but  he  did  not  notice  it,  and  I  am  frank  to  say  he  did 
not  appear  to  feel  the  slightest  personal  fear  of  me. 
Thus,  face  to  face,  I  saw  the  man  with  whom  I  had 

61 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 

trod  Ned  Buntline's  boundless  plains  and  had  seen 
and  encountered  a  thousand  perils  and  redskins. 
When  the  act  call  came,  and  I  rose  to  go,  a  man 
stopped  at  the  door  and  said  to  him: 

"What  shall  it  be  to-night,  Colonel?" 

"A  big  beef-steak  and  a  bottle  of  Bass!"  answered 
Buffalo  Bill  heartily,  "and  tell  'em  to  have  it  hot  and 
ready  at  11:15." 

The  beef-steak  and  Bass'  ale  were  the  watchwords 
of  true  heroism.  The  real  hero  requires  substantial 
filling.  He  must  have  a  head  and  a  heart — but  no 
less  a  good,  healthy  and  impatient  stomach. 

In  the  daily  paper  the  morning  I  write  this  I  see 
the  announcement  of  Buffalo  Bill's  "Wild  West 
Show"  coming  two  week's  hence.  Good  luck  to 
him!  He  can't  charge  prices  too  steep  for  me,  and 
there  are  six  seats  necessary — the  best  in  the  amphi- 
theater. And  I  wish  I  could  be  sure  the  vigorous 
spirit  of  Ned  Buntline  would  be  looking  down  from 
the  blue  sky  overhead  to  see  his  hero  charge  the 
hill  of  San  Juan  at  the  head  of  the  Rough  Riders. 


This  digression  may  be  wide  of  the  subject  of 
novel  reading,  but  the  real  novel  reader  is  at  home 
anywhere.  He  has  thoughts,  dreams,  reveries,  fan- 
cies. All  the  world  is  his  novel  and  all  actions  are 
stories  and  all  the  actors  are  characters.  When 
Lucile  Western,  the  excellent  American  actress,  was 
at  the  height  of  her  powers,  not  long  before  her  last 
appearances,  she  had  as  her  leading  man  a  big, 
slouchy  and  careless  person,  who  was  advertised  as 
"the  talented  young  English  actor,  William  Whal- 
ly."  In  the  intimacies  of  private  association  he  was 
known  as  Bill  Whally,  and  his  descent  was  straight 


THE     OPEN     POLAR     SEA 


down  from  "Mount  Sinai's  awful  height."  He  was 
a  Hebrew  and  no  better  or  more  uneven  and  reck- 
less actor  ever  played  melodramatic  "heavies."  He 
had  a  love  for  Shakespeare,  but  could  not  play  him; 
he  had  a  love  of  drink  and  could  gratify  it.  His  vig- 
orous talents  purchased  for  him  much  forbearance. 
I've  seen  Mr.  Whally  play  the  fastidious  and  elegant 
"Sir  Archibald  Levison"  in  shiny  black  doe-skin 
trousers  and  old-fashioned  cloth  gaiters,  because  his 
condition  rendered  the  problem  of  dressing  some- 
what doubtful,  though  it  could  not  obscure  his  act- 
ing. He  was  the  only  walking  embodiment  of  "Bill 
Sykes"  I  ever  saw,  and  I  contracted  the  habit  of 
going  to  see  him  kill  Miss  Western  as  "Nancy"  be- 
cause he  butchered  that  young  woman  with  a  broken 
chair  more  satisfactorily  than  anybody  else  I  ever 
saw.  There  was  a  murderer  for  you — Bill  Sykes  I 
Bad  as  he  was  in  most  things,  let  us  not  forget  that 
— he  —  killed  —  Nancy  —  and  —  killed  —  her  —  well 
and — thoroughly.  If  that  young  woman  didn't  snivel 
herself  under  a  just  sentence  of  death,  I'm  no  fit 
householder  to  serve  on  a  jury.  Every  time  Miss 
Western  came  around  it  was  my  custom  to  read  up 
fresh  on  "Oliver  Twist"  and  hurry  around  and  enjoy 
Bill  Whally's  happy  application  of  retribution  with 
the  aid  of  the  old  property  chair.  There  were  six 
other  persons  whom  I  succeeded  in  persuading  to 
applaud  the  scene  with  me  every  time  it  was  acted. 
But  there's  a  separate  chapter  for  villains. 


Let    us    return    to    the    old    novels.     What  curious 

pranks   time    plays   with   tastes   and    vogues.  Forty 

years  ago  N.  P.  Willis  was  just  faded.     Yet  he  was 

63 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 

long  a  great  comet  of  literary  glitter  and  obscured 
many  men  of  much  greater  ability.  Everybody  read 
him;  the  annuals  hung  upon  his  name;  the  ladies  re- 
garded him  as  a  finer  and  more  dashing  Byron  than 
Byron.  The  place  he  filled  was  much  like  that  of 
Congreve,  before  whom  Shakespeare's  great  nose 
was  out  of  joint  for  a  long  time;  Congreve,  who  was 
the  margarita  aluminata  major  of  English  poesy 
and  drama  and  public  life,  and  is  now  found  in  junk 
stores  and  in  the  back  line  on  book  shelves  and 
whom  nobody  reads  now.  Willis  had  his  languid 
affectations,  his  superficial  cynicism  and  added  to 
them  ostentatious  sentimentality. 

Does  anybody  read  William  Gilmore  Simm's  elab- 
orate rhetoric  disguised  as  novels?  He  must  have 
written  two  dozen  of  them,  the  Richardson  of  the 
United  States.  Lovers  of  delicious  wit  and  intellec- 
tual humor  still  read  Dr.  Holmes'  essays,  but  it 
would  probably  take  a  physician's  prescription  to 
make  them  swallow  the  novels.  In  what  dark  cor- 
ners of  the  library  are  Bayard  Taylor's  novels  and 
travels  hidden?  Will  you  come  into  the  garden, 
Maud,  and  read  Chancellor  Walworth's  mighty 
tragedies  and  Miss  Mulock's  Swiss-toy  historical 
novels,  or  will  you  beg  off,  like  the  honest  girl  you 
are,  and  take  a  nap?  Your  sleepiness,  dear  Miss 
Maud,  does  you  credit.  By  the  way,  what  the  deuce 
is  the  name  of  anyone  of  these  novels?  I  can  recall 
"Elsie  Venner,"  by  Dr.  Holmes  and  then  there  is  a 
blank. 

But  what  classics  they  were — then!  In  the  thick 
of  them  had  appeared  a  newspaper  story  that  strug- 
gled through  and  was  printed  in  book  form.  Old 
friends  have  told  me  how  they  waited  at  the  country 

64 


THE     OPEN     POLAR     SEA 

post-offices  to  get  a  copy,  delayed  for  weeks.  It 
was  a  scandal  to  read  it  in  some  localities.  It  was 
fiercely  attacked  as  an  outrageous  exaggeration  pro- 
duced by  temporary  excitement  and  hostile  feeling, 
or  praised  as  a  new  gospel.  It  has  been  translated 
into  every  tongue  having  a  printing  press,  and  has 
sold  by  millions  of  copies.  It  was  "Uncle  Tom's 
Cabin."  It  was  not  a  classic,  but  what  a  vigorous  im- 
mortal mongrel  of  human  sentiment  it  was  I  What  a 
row  was  kicked  up  over  Miss  Braddon's  "Octoroon," 
and  what  an  impossible  yellowback  it  was!  The  tough- 
est piece  of  fiction  I  met  with  as  a  boy  was  "San- 
ford  and  Merton,"  and  I've  been  aching  to  say  so 
for  four  pages.  If  this  world  were  full  of  Sanfords 
and  Mertons,  then  give  me  Jupiter  or  some  other 
comfortable  planet  at  a  secure  sanitary  distance  re- 
moved. 

I  can't  even  remember  the  writers  who  were  gram- 
matically and  rhetorically  perfect  forty  years  ago,  and 
also  very  dull  with  it  all.  Is  there  a  bookshelf  that 
holds  "Leni  Leoti,  or  The  Flower  of  the  Prairies?" 
There  are  "Jane  Eyre,"  "Lady  Audley's  Secret,"  and 
"John  Halifax,  Gentleman,"  which  will  go  with  many 
and  are  all  well  worth  the  reading,  too.  Are  Mrs.  Eliza 
A.  Dupuy,  Mrs.  E.  D.  E.  N.  Southworth,  Mrs.  Caroline 
Lee  Hentz  and  Augusta  J.  Evans  dead?  Their 
novels  still  live — look  at  the  book  stores.  "Linda, 
or  the  Young  Pilot  of  the  Belle  Creole,"  "India,  the 
Pearl  of  Pearl  River,"  "The  Planter's  Northern 
Bride,"  "St.  Elmo" — they  were  fiction  for  you!  A  boy 
old  enough  to  have  a  first  sweetheart  could  swallow 
them  by  the  mile. 

You  remember,  when  we  were  boys,  the  circus 
acrobats   always — always,    remember — rubbed    young 

65 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 

children  with  snake-oil  and  walloped  them  with  a 
rawhide  to  educate  them  in  tumbling  and  contortion? 
Well,  if  I  could  get  the  snake-oil  for  the  joints  and  a 
curly  young  wig,  I'd  like  to  get  back  at  five  hundred 
of  those  books  and  devour  them  again — "as  of  yore!" 


VI 

RASCALS 

BEING   A   DISCOURSE   UPON   GOOD,   HONEST 
SCOUNDRELISM  AND  VILLAINS. 

THE  people  that  inhabit  novels  are  like  other 
peoples  of  the  earth — if  they  are  peaceful,  they 
have  no  history.  So  that,  therefore,  in  novels, 
as  in  nations,  it  is  the  great  restless  heights  of  so- 
ciety that  are  to  be  approached  with  greatest  awe 
and  that  engage  admiration  and  regard.  Everybody 
is  interested  in  Nero,  but  not  one  person  in  ten 
thousand  can  tell  you  anything  definite  about  Con- 
stantine  or  even  Marcus  Aurelius.  If  you  should 
speak  off-handedly  about  Amelia  Sedley  in  the  pres- 
ence of  a  thousand  average  readers  you  would  prob- 
ably miss  85  per  cent,  of  effect;  if  you  said  Becky 
Sharp  the  whole  thousand  would  understand. 

There  is  this  to  be  said  of  disreputable  folk,  that 
they  are  clever  and  picturesque  and  interesting,  at 
least. 

An  elderly  jeweler  in  New  York  City  was  arrested 
several  years  ago  upon  the  charge  of  receiving  stolen 
gold  and  silver  plate,  watches  and  jewelry  from  well- 
known  thieves.  For  forty  years  he  had  been  a  re- 
spected merchant,  a  church  officer,  a  husband,  father, 
and  citizen,  of  irreproachable  reputation,  with  en- 
during friendships.  He  was  charitable,  liberal  and 
kindly.  For  decade  after  decade  he  was  the  ex- 
perienced, wise  and  fatherly  "fence"  of  professional 
burglars  and  thieves.     Why,  it  would  be  an  education 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 

in  itself  to  know  that  man,  to  shake  his  honest  hand, 
fresh  from  charity  or  concealment,  and  smoke  a 
pipe  with  him  and  hear  him  talk  about  things  frank" 
ly.  When  he  gave  to  the  missionary  collection,  rest 
assured  he  gave  sincerely;  when  he  "covered  swag," 
into  the  melting  pot  for  an  industrious  burglar,  he 
did  so  only  in  the  regular  course  of  business. 

Strange  as  it  may  seem,  even  criminals  have  hu- 
man feelings  in  common  with  all  of  us.  The  old 
Thug  who  stepped  aside  into  the  bushes  and  prayed 
earnestly  while  his  son  was  throwing  his  first 
strangling  cloth  around  the  throat  of  the  English 
traveler — prayed  for  that  son's  honorable,  success- 
ful beginning  in  his  life  devotion — was  a  good  father. 
And  when  he  was  told  that  the  son  had  acted  with 
unusual  skill,  who  can  doubt  that  his  tears  of  joy 
were  sincere  and  humble  tears  of  thankfulness?  At 
least  Bowanee  knew.  Can  you  not  imagine  a  kind- 
hearted  Chinese  matron  saying  to  her  neighbor  over 
the  bamboo  fence,  "Yes,  we  sent  the  baby  down  to 
the  beach  (or  the  river  bank  or  the  forest)  yester- 
day. We  couldn't  afford  to  keep  it.  I  hope  the  gods 
have  taken  its  little  soul.     At  any  rate  it  is  sure  of 

salvation  hereafter." 

*   *   * 

Some  twenty  years  ago  I  took  the  night  train 
from  Pineville  to  Barbourville,  in  the  Kentucky  moun- 
tains, reaching  the  latter  place  about  11  o'clock  of  a 
cold,  rainy,  dark  November  night.  Only  one  other 
passenger  alighted.  There  was  an  express  wagon  to 
take  us  to  the  town,  a  mile  or  so  distant,  and  the 
wagon  was  already  heavy  with  freight  packages. 
The  road  was  through  a  narrow  lane,  hub-deep  with 
mud,  and  what,  with  stalling  and  resting,  we  were 
more  than  half  an  hour  getting  to  the  hotel.     My  fel- 


SCOUNDRELISM     AND     VILLIANS 


low  passenger  was  about  my  age,  and  was  a  shrewd, 
well-informed  native  of  the  vicinity.  He  knew  the 
mineral,  timber  and  agricultural  resources,  was  evi- 
dently an  enterprising  business  man  and  an  intelli- 
gent but  not  voluble  talker.  He  accepted  a  cigar, 
and  advised  me  to  see  the  house  in  Barbourville 
where  the  late  Justice  Samuel  Miller  was  bom.  At 
the  hotel  he  registered  first,  and,  as  he  was  going  to 
leave  next  day  and  I  was  to  remain  several  days,  he 
told  the  clerk  to  give  me  the  better  of  the  two  rooms 
vacant.  It  was  a  very  pleasant  act  of  thoughtful- 
ness.  The  name  on  the  register  was  "A.  Johnson." 
The  next  day  I  asked  the  clerk  about  Mr.  Johnson. 
My  fellow  passenger  was  Andy  Johnson,  whose  fame 
as  a  feud-fighter  and  slayer  of  men  has  never  been 
exceeded  in  the  history  of  mountain  feuds.  He  then 
had  three  or  four  men  to  his  credit,  definitely,  and 
several  doubtful  ascriptions.  He  added  a  few  more, 
I  believe,  before  he  met  the  inevitable. 

Now,  while  Mr.  Johnson,  in  all  matters  where 
killing  seemed  to  him  to  be  appropriate,  was  a  most 
prompt  and  accurate  man  in  accomplishing  it,  yet  he 
was  not  the  murderer  that  ignorant  and  isolated 
folks  conceive  such  persons  to  be.  The  cigar  I  had 
given  him  was  a  very  bad,  cheap  cigar,  and,  if  he 
had  merely  wanted  murder,  he  had  every  reason 
to  kill  me  for  giving  it  to  him,  and  he  had  a  perfect 
night  for  the  deed.  But  he  smoked  it  to  the  stub 
without  a  complaint  or  remark  and  saw  that  I  got 
the  best  room  in  the  hotel.  Johnson  was  a  cautious 
and  considerate  fellow-man,  whose  murders  were 
doubtless  private  hobbies  and  exercises  growing  out 
of  his  environment  and  heredity. 

One  of  the  houses  I  most  delight  to  enter  in  a  cer- 
tain town  is  one  where   I   am  always   sure  to  see  a 


THE     DELICIOUS    VICE 

devoted  and  happy  wife  and  beautiful,  playful  chil- 
dren clustering  around  the  armchair  in  which  sits  a 
man  who  committed  one  of  the  most  cold-blooded 
assassinations  you  can  imagine.  He  is  an  honored, 
esteemed  and  model  citizen.  His  acquittal  was  a 
miracle  in  a  million  chances.  He  has  justified  it. 
It  is  beautiful  to  see  those  happy  children  clinging 
to  the  hand  that — 

Well,  dear  friends,  the  dentist  is  not  a  cruel  man 
in  his  social  capacity,  and  you  can  get  delicious 
viands  instead  of  nauseous  medicines  at  the  doctor's 
private  table. 

That  is  why  beginning  novel  readers  should  take 
no  advice.  Strike  out  alone  through  the  highways 
and  lanes  of  story,  character  and  experience.  The 
best  novelist  is  the  one  who  fears  not  to  tell  you  the 
truth,  which  is  more  wonderful  than  fiction.  It  is 
always  the  best  hearts  that  bend  to  mistakes.  Abso- 
lute virtue  is  as  sterile  as  granite  rock;  absolute  vice 
is  as  poisonous  as  a  stagnant  pond.  No  healthy  in- 
terest or  speculation  can  linger  about  either.  Enter 
into  the  struggle  and  know  human  nature;  don't 
stay  outside  and  try  to  appear  superior. 

For,  which  of  us  has  not  his  crimes  of  thought  to 
account  for?  Think  not,  because  Andy  Johnson  or 
William  Sykes  or  Dr.  Webster  actually  killed  his 
man,  that  you  are  guiltless,  because  you  haven't. 
Have  you  never  wanted  to?  Answer  that,  in  your 
conscience  and  in  solitude — not  to  me.  Speak  up  to 
yourself  and  then  say  whether  the  difference  between 
you  and  the  recorded  criminal  is  not  merely  the  dif- 
ference between  the  overt  act  and  the  faltering  wish. 
It  is  a  matter  of  courage  or  of  custom.  Speaking 
for  one  gentleman,  who  knows  himself  and  is  not 
afraid  to  confess,  I  can  say  that,  while  he  could  not 

70 


SCOUNDRELISM     AND     VILLIANS 


kill  a  mouse  with  his  own  hand,  he  has  often  mur- 
dered men  in  his  heart.  It  may  have  been  in  fiery 
youth  over  the  wrong  name  on  a  dancing  card,  or, 
later,  when  a  rival  got  the  better  of  him  in  discus- 
sion, or,  when  the  dreary  bore  came  and  wouldn't 
go,  or,  when  misdirected  goodness  insisted  on  thrust- 
ing upon  him  intended  kindness  that  was  worm- 
wood and  poison  to  the  soul.  Are  we  not  covetous 
(not  confessedly,  of  course,  but  actually)?  Is  not 
covetousness  the  thwarted  desire  of  theft  without 
courage?  How  many  of  us,  now — speaking  man  to 
man — can  open  up  our  veiled  thoughts  and  desires 
and  then  look  the  Ten  Commandments  in  the  eye 
without  blushing? 


The  bravest,  noblest,  gentlest  gentleman  I  have 
ever  known  was  the  Count  de  la  Fere,  whom  we  at 
the  Hotel  de  Troisville,  in  old  Paris,  called  "Athos." 
He  was  not  merely  sans  peur  et  sans  reproche  as 
Bayard,  but  was  positive  in  his  virtues.  He  fought 
for  his  friends  without  even  asking  the  cause  of  the 
fray.  Yet,  what  a  prig  he  seemed  to  be  at  first,  with 
his  eternal  gentle  melancholy,  his  irreproachable 
courtesy,  unvarying  kindness  and  complete  unselfish- 
ness. You  cannot — quite — warm — to — a — man — who 
—  is  —  so  —  perfectly  —  right  —  that  —  he  —  em- 
barrasses— everybody — but — the — angels. 

But,  when  he  ordered  the  gloomy  and  awful  death 
of  the  treacherous  Miladi,  woman  though  she  was, 
and  thus  as  a  perfect  gentleman  took  on  human 
frailty  also,  ah!  how  attractively  noble  and  strong 
he  became!  In  that  respect  he  was  the  antithetical 
corollary  of  William  Sykes,  who  was  a  purposeless, 
useless    and    uninterestingly    regular   scoundrel,    thief 

71 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 

and  brute,  until  he  redeemed  himself  by  becoming 
the  instrument  of  social  justice  and  pounding  that 
unendurable  lady,  Miss  Nancy,  of  his  name,  into 
absence  from  the  world.  Perhaps  I  have  remarked 
before — and  even  if  I  have  it  is  pleasant  to  repeat 
it — that  Bill  Sykes  had  his  faults,  as  also  have  most 
of  us,  but  it  was  given  to  him  to  earn  forgiveness  by 
the  aid  of  a  cheap  chair  and  the  providential  propin- 
quity of  Miss  Nancy.  I  never  think  of  it  without 
regretting  that  poor  Bill  Whally  is  dead.  He  did 
it — so — much — to — my — taste  I 

Who  shall  we  say  is  the  most  loved  and  respected 
criminal  in  fiction?  Not  Monsignor  Rodin,  of  "The 
Wandering  Jew;"  not  Thenardier  in  "Les  Misera- 
bles."  These  are  really  not  criminals;  they  are  alle- 
gorical figures  of  perfect  crime.  They  are  solar  cen- 
ters, so  far  off  and  fixed  that  one  may  regard  them 
only  with  awe,  reverence  and  fear.  They  are  types 
of  fate,  desire,  temptation  and  chastisement.  Let  us 
turn  to  our  own  flesh  and  blood  and  speak  grate- 
fully of  them. 


Who  says  Count  Fosco?  Now  there  is  a  criminal 
worthy  of  affection  and  confidence.  What  an  ex- 
pansive nature,  with  kindness  presented  on  every 
side.  Even  the  dogs  fawned  upon  him  and  the  birds 
came  at  his  call.  An  accomplished  gentleman,  con- 
siderately mannered — queer,  as  becomes  a  foreigner, 
yet  possessing  the  touchstone  of  universal  sympathy. 
Another  man  with  crime  to  commit  almost  certainly 
would  have  dispatched  it  with  ruthless  coldness;  but 
how  kindly  and  gently  Count  Fosco  administered 
the  cord  of  necessity.  With  what  delicacy  he  con- 
cealed  the   bowstring   and   spoke   of  the   Bosphorus 

72 


SCOUNDRELISM     AND     VILLIANS 


only  as  a  place  for  moonlight  excursions.  He  could 
have  presented  prussic  acid  and  sherry  to  a  lady 
in  such  a  manner  as  to  render  the  results  a  grateful 
sacrifice  to  his  courtesy.  It  was  all  due  to  his  cor- 
pulence; a  "lean  and  hungry"  villain  lacks  repose, 
patience  and  the  tact  of  good  humor.  In  almost 
every  small  social  and  individual  attitude  Count 
Fosco  was  human.  He  was  exceedingly  attentive  to 
his  wife  in  society  and  bullied  her  only  in  private 
and  when  necessary.  He  struck  no  dramatic  atti- 
tudes. "The  world  is  mine  oyster!"  is  not  said  by 
real  men  bent  on  terrible  deeds.  Count  Fosco  is 
the  perfect  villain,  and  also  the  perfect  criminal,  in- 
asmuch as  he  not  only  acts  naturally,  but  deliber- 
ately determines  the  action  instead  of  being  drawn 
into  it  or  having  it  forced  upon  him. 

He  was  a  highly  cultivated  type  of  Andy  Johnson, 
inasmuch  as  crime  with  him  was  not  a  life  purpose, 
but  what  is  called  in  business  a  "side-line."  All  of 
us  have  our  hobbies;  the  closely  confined  clerk  goes 
home  and  roots  up  his  yard  to  plant  flower  bulbs 
or  cabbage  plants;  another  fancies  fowls;  an- 
other man  collects  pewter  pots  and  old  brass  and 
the  millionaire  takes  to  priceless  horses;  others  of 
us  turn  from  useful  statistics  and  go  broke  on  novels 
or  poetry  or  music.  Count  Fosco  was  an  educated 
gentleman  and  the  pleasure  of  life  was  his  purpose; 
crime  and  intrigue  were  his  recreations.  Andy 
Johnson  was  a  good  business  man  and  wealth  pro- 
ducer; murder  was  the  direction  in  which  his  private 
understanding  of  personal  disagreements  was  exer- 
cised and  vented.  Some  men  turn  to  poker  playing, 
which  is  as  wasteful  as  murder  and  not  half  as  dig- 
nified. 


73 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 

Count  Fosco  is  the  villain  par  excellence  of  novels. 
I  do  not  remember  what  he  did,  because  "The  Wo- 
man in  White"  is  the  best  novel  in  the  world  to  read 
gluttonously  at  a  sitting  and  then  forget  absolutely. 
It  is  nearly  always  a  new  book  if  you  use  it  that 
way.  When  the  world  is  dark,  the  fates  bilious,  the 
appetite  dead  and  the  infernal  twinges  of  pain  or 
sickness  seem  beyond  reach  of  the  doctor,  "The  Wo- 
man in  White"  is  a  friend  indeed. 


But  the  man  of  men  for  villains,  not  necessarily 
criminals;  but  the  ordinary,  every-day,  picturesque 
worthies  of  good,  honest  scoundrelism  and  disrepu- 
tableness  is  Sir  Robert  Louis  Stevenson.  You  can 
afford  conscientiously  to  stuff  ballot  boxes  in  order 
that  his  election  may  be  secured  as  Poet  Laureate  of 
Rascals.  Leaving  out  John  Silver  and  Billy  Bones 
and  Alan  Breck,  whom  every  privately  shriven  ras- 
cal of  us  simply  must  honor  and  revere  as  giants 
of  courage,  cunning  and  controlled,  conscience,  Ste- 
venson turned  from  singles  and  pairs,  and  in  "The 
Ebb  Tide,"  drove,  by  turns,  tandem  and  abreast,  a 
four-in-hand  of  scoundrels  so  buoyant,  natural, 
strong,  and  yet  each  so  totally  unlike  the  others,  that 
every  honest  novel  reader  may  well  be  excused  for 
shedding  tears  when  he  reflects  that  the  marvelous 
hand  and  heart  that  created  them  are  gone  forever 
from  the  haunts  of  the  interestingly  wicked.  No 
novelist  ever  exposed  the  human  nature  of  rascals 
as  Stevenson  did. 

Now,  lago  was  not  a  villain;  he  was  a  venomous 
toad,  a  scorpion,  a  mad-dog,  a  poisonous  plant  in  a 
fair    meadow.     There    was    nobody    lago    loved,    no 

74 


SCOUNDRELISM     AND     VILLIANS 


weakness  he  concealed,  no  point  of  contact  with 
any  human  being.  His  sister  was  Pandora,  his 
brother  made  the  shirt  of  Nessus,  himself  dealt  in 
Black  Plagues  and  the  Leprosy.  The  old  Serpent 
was  permitted  to  rise  from  his  belly  and  walk  upright 
on  the  tip  of  his  tail  when  he  met  lago,  as  a  demon- 
stration of  moral  superiority.  But  think  of  those 
three  Babes-in-the-Wood  villains,  skipper  Davis,  the 
Yankee  swashbuckler  and  ship  scuttler;  Herrick, 
the  dreamy  poet,  ruined  by  commerce  and  early  love, 
with  his  days  of  remorse  and  his  days  of  compensa- 
tary  liquor;  and  Huish,  the  great-hearted  Scotch 
ruffian,  who  chafed  at  the  conventional  concealments 
of  trade  among  pals  and  never  could — as  a  true 
Scotchman — understand  why  you  should  wait  to  use 
a  knife  upon  a  victim  when  promptness  lay  in  the 
club  right  at  hand — think  of  them  sailing  out  of  Hon- 
olulu harbor  on  the  Farallone. 

Let  who  will  prefer  to  have  sailed  with  Jason  or 
Aeneas  or  Sinbad;  but  the  Farallone  and  its  precious 
freight  of  rascality  gets  my  money  every  time.  Think 
of  the  three  incomparable  reprobates  afloat,  with  one 
case  of  smallpox  and  a  cargo  of  champagne,  daring 
to  make  no  port,  with  over  a  hundred  million  square 
miles  of  ocean  around  them,  every  ten  lookout  knots 
of  it  containing  a  possible  peril!  It  was  simply 
grand — not  pirates,  shipwrecks  or  mutinies  could 
beat  that  problem.  And  the  pathos  of  the  sixth  day, 
when,  with  every  man  Jack  of  them  looking  delirium 
tremens  in  the  face  and  suspecting  each  the  other, 
Mr.  Huish  opened  a  new  case  of  champagne  and 
— found  clear  spring  water  under  the  French  label! 
The  honest  scoundrels  had  been  laid  by  the  heels 
by  a  common  wine  merchant  in  the  regular  way  of 
business!     Oh,    gentlemen,    there    should    be    honor 

75 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 

in  business;  so  that  gallant  villains  can  be  free  of 
betrayal. 

The  keynote  of  these  gentlemen  is  struck  in  the 
second  chapter,  where  all  three  of  them  writing  lies 
home — Davis  and  Herrick,  sentimental  equivocations, 
Huish  the  strongest  of  brag  with  nobody  to  send  it 
to.  In  a  burst  of  weakness  Davis  tells  Herrick  what 
a  villain  he  has  been,  through  rum,  and  how  he  can 
not  let  his  daughter,  "little  Adar,"  know  it.  "Yes, 
there  was  a  woman  on  board,"  he  said,  describing 
the  ship  he  had  scuttled.  "Guess  I  sent  her  to  hell, 
if  there's  such  a  place.  I  never  dared  go  home  again, 
and  I  don't  know,"  he  added,  bitterly,  "what's  come 
to  them." 

"Thank  you.  Captain,"  said  Herrick,  "I  never 
liked  you  better!" 

Is  it  not  in  human  nature  to  cuddle  to  a  great 
sheepish  murderer  like  that,  who  groans  in  secret  for 
his  little  girl — if  even  the  girl  was  truth?  I  think 
she  turned  out  a  myth,  but  he  had  the  sentiment. 

Was  there  ever  a  more  melancholy,  remorse-stricken 
wretch  than  Cap'n  Davis?  Or  a  gentler  and  seedier 
poet  than  Herrick?  Or  a  m.ore  finely  sodden  and 
soaked  old  rum  sport  than  Huish  (not — Whish!) 
But  it  was  not  until  they  fell  in  with  Attwater  that 
their  weakness  as  scoundrels  was  exposed.  Attwater 
was  so  splendidly  religious!  He  was  determined  to 
have  things  right  if  he  had  to  have  them  so  by 
bloodshed;  he  saved  souls  by  bullets.  Things  were 
right  when  they  were  as  he  thought  they  should  be. 
And  believing  so,  with  Torquemada,  Alexander  Six- 
tus  and  other  most  religious  brethren,  he  was  ready 
to  set  up  the  stake  and  fagot  and  cauterize  sin  with 
fire.  One  thing  you  can  say  about  the  religious  folks 
that  are  big  with  cocksureness  and  a  mission — they 


SCOUNDRELISM     AND     VILLAINS 

may  make  mistakes,  but  the  mistake  doesn't  talk  and 
criticise. 


The  only  rascal  worthy  to  travel  in  company  with 
Stevenson's  rascals  is  the  Chevalier  Balibari,  of 
Castle  Barry,  in  Ireland,  whose  admirable  memoirs 
have  been  so  well  told  by  Mr.  Thackeray.  The  Baron 
de  la  Motte  in  "Denis  Duval,"  was  advantageously 
bom  to  ornament  the  purple  and  fine  linen  of  pic- 
turesque unrighteousness — but  his  was  a  brief  star 
that  fell  unfinished  from  its  place  amidst  the  Pleiades. 
Thackeray's  genius  ran  more  to  disreputable  men 
than  to  actual  villains.  But  he  drew  two  scoundrels 
that  will  serve  as  beacon  lights  to  any  clean-souled 
youth  with  the  instinct  to  take  warning.  One  was 
Lord  Steyne,  the  other,  Dr.  George  Brand  Firmin; 
one  the  aristocratic,  class-bred,  cynical  brute,  the 
other  the  cold,  tuft-hunting  trained  hypocrite.  What 
encouragement  of  self-respect  Judas  Iscariot  might 
have  received  if  he  had  met  Dr.  Firmin! 

Dr.  Chadband,  Mr.  Pecksniff,  Bill  Sykes,  Fagin, 
Mr.  Murdstone,  of  Dickens'  family — they  are  all 
strong  in  impression,  but  wholly  unreal;  mere  stage 
villains  and  caricatures.  A  villain  who  has  no  good 
traits,  no  hobbies  of  kindness  and  affection,  is  never 
born  into  the  world;  he  is  always  created  by  grotesque 
novel  writers. 

The  villains  of  Dumas,  Hugo,  Balzac,  Daudet  are 
French.  There  may  have  been,  or  may  be  now  .-uch 
prototypes  alive  in  France — because  the  Dreyfus  case 
occurred  in  France,  and  no  doubt  much  can  happen 
in  that  fine,  fertile  country  which  translators  cannot 
fully  convey  over  the  frontiers;  but  they  have  always 
seemed  to  me  first  cousins  to  my  friends,  the  ogres, 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 

the  evil  magicians  and  the  werewolves,  and,  in  that 
much,  not  quite  natural. 

For  heroes  of  the  genuine  cavalleria  type,  plumed, 
doubleted,  pumpt  and  magnificent,  give  me  Dumas; 
for  good  folks  and  true,  the  great  American  Fenimore 
Cooper;  but  for  the  blessed  company  of  blooming, 
breathing  rascals,  Stevenson  and  Thackeray  all  the 
time. 


78 


VII 

HEROES 

THE   NATURE  AND  THE  FLOWER  OF  THEM 

—THE  GALLANT  D'ARTAGNAN  OR  THE 

GLORIOUS  BUSSY. 

LET  us  agree  at  the  start  that  no  perfect  hero 
-  can  be  entirely  mortal.  The  nearer  the  ele- 
ment of  mortality  in  him  corresponds  to  the 
heel  measure  of  Achilles,  the  better  his  chance  as 
hero.  The  Egyptian  and  Greek  heroes  were  invari- 
ably demi-gods  on  the  paternal  or  maternal  side. 
Few  actual  historic  heroes  have  escaped  popular 
scandal  concerning  their  origin,  because  the  savage 
logic  in  us  demands  lions  from  a  lion;  that  Theseus 
shall  trace  to  Mars;  that  courage  shall  spring  from 
courage. 

Another  most  excellent  thing  about  the  ideal  hero  is 
that  the  immortal  quality  enables  him  to  go  about  the 
business  of  his  heroism  without  bothering  his  head 
with  the  rights  or  wrongs  of  it,  except  as  the  pre- 
vailing sentiment  of  social  honor  (as  distinguished 
from  the  inborn  sentiment  of  honesty)  requires  at 
the  time.  Of  course,  there  is  a  lower  grade  of  meas- 
ly, "moral  heroes,"  who  (thank  heaven  and  the 
innate  sense  of  human  justice!)  are  usually  well  pep- 
pered with  sorrow  and  punishment.  The  hero  of 
romance  is  a  different  stripe;  Hyperion  to  a  Satyr. 
He  doesn't  go  around  groaning  page  after  page  of 
top-heavy  debates  as  to  the  inherent  justice  of  his 
cause  or  his  moral   right   to  thrust  a  tallow   candle 

79 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 

between  the  particular  ribs  behind  which  the  heart 
of  his  enemy  is  to  be  found — balancing  his  pros  and 
cons,  seeking  a  quo  for  each  quid,  and  conscientiously 
prowling  for  final  authorities.  When  you  invade 
the  chiropodical  secret  of  the  real  hero's  fine  boot, 
or  brush  him  in  passing — if  you  have  looked  once 
too  often  at  a  certain  lady,  or  have  stood  between 
him  and  the  sun,  or  even  twiddled  your  thumbs  at 
him  in  an  indecorous  or  careless  manner — look  to  it 
that  you  be  prepared  to  draw  and  mayhap  to  be 
spitted  upon  his  sword's  point,  with  honor.  Sdeath! 
A  gentlemen  of  courage  carries  his  life  lightly  at  the 
needle  end  of  his  rapier,  as  that  wonderful  Japanese, 
Samsori,  used  to  make  the  flimsiest  feather  preside 
in  miraculous  equilibration  upon  the  tip  of  his  hand- 
some nose. 

No  hero  who  does  more  or  less  than  is  demanded 
by  the  best  practical  opinion  of  the  society  of  his 
time  is  worth  more  than  thirty  cents  as  a  hero. 
Boys  are  literary  and  dramatic  critics  so  far  above 
the  critics  formed  by  strained  formulas  of  the  schools 
that  you  can  trust  them.  They  have  an  unerring  dis- 
trust of  the  fellow  who  moves  around  with  his  con- 
founded conscientious  scruples,  as  if  the  well-settled 
opinion  of  the  breathing  world  were  not  good  enough 
for  him!  Who  the  deuce  has  got  any  business  setting 
everybody  else  right? 

Some  of  these  days  I  believe  it  is  going  to  be  dis- 
covered that  the  atmosphere  and  the  encompassing 
radiance  and  sweetness  of  Heaven  are  composed  of 
the  dear  sighs  and  loving  aspirations  of  earthly 
motherhood.  If  it  turns  out  otherwise,  rest  assured 
Heaven  will  not  have  reached  its  perfect  point  of 
evolution.  Why  is  it,  then,  that  mothers  will — will 
— will — try,  so  mistakenly,  to  extirpate  the  jewel  of 

80 


ABOUT     THE     HEROES 


honest,  manly  savagery  from  the  breasts  of  their 
boys?  I  wonder  if  they  know  that  when  grown  men 
see  one  of  these  "pretty-mannered  boys,"  cocksure 
as  a  Swiss  toy  new  painted  and  directed  by  watch 
spring,  they  feel  an  unholy  impulse  to  empty  an  ink- 
bottle  over  the  young  calf?  Fauntleroy  kids  are  a 
reproach  to  our  civilization.  Men,  women  and  chil- 
dren, all  of  us,  crowd  around  the  grimy  Deignan  of 
the  Merrimac  crew,  and  shout  and  cheer  for  Bill 
Smith,  the  Rough  Rider,  who  carried  his  mate  out  of 
the  ruck  at  San  Juan  and  twirls  his  hat  awkwardly 
and  explains:  "Ef  I  hadn't  a  saw  him  fall  he  would 
'a'  laid  thar  yit!" — and  go  straight  home  and  pretend 
to  be  proud  of  a  snug  little  poodle  of  a  man  who 
doesn't  play  for  fear  of  soiling  his  picture-clothes, 
and  who  says:  "Yes,  sir,  thank  you,"  and  "No, 
thank  you,  ma'am,"  like  a  French  doll  before  it  has 
had  the  sawdust  kicked  out  of  it! 


Now,  when  a  hero  tries  to  stamp  his  acts  with  the 
precise  quality  of  exact  justice — why,  he  performs 
no  acts.  He  is  no  better  than  that  poor  tongue-loose 
Hamlet,  who  argues  you  the  right  of  everything,  and 
then,  by  the  great  Jingo!  piles  in  and  messes  it  all 
by  doing  the  wrong  thing  at  the  wrong  time  and  in 
the  wrong  manner.  It  is  permitted  of  course  to  be 
a  great  moral  light  and  correct  the  errors  of  all  the 
dust  of  earth  that  has  been  blown  into  life  these  ages; 
but  human  justice  has  been  measured  out  unerringly 
with  poetry  and  irony  to  such  folk.  They  are  ad- 
mitted to  be  saints,  but  about  the  time  they  have 
got  too  good  for  their  earthly  setting,  they  have 
been  tied  to  stakes  and  lighted  up  with  oil  and  fag- 
gots; or  a  soda  phosphate  with  a  pinch  of  cyanide  of 

81 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 

potassium  inserted  has  been  handed  to  them,  as  in 
the  case  of  our  old  friend,  Socrates.  And  it's  right. 
When  a  man  gets  too  wise  and  good  for  his  fellows 
and  is  embarrassed  by  the  healthful  scent  of  good 
human  nature,  send  him  to  heaven  for  relief,  where 
he  can  have  the  goodly  fellowship  of  the  prophets, 
the  company  of  the  noble  army  of  martyrs,  and 
amuse  himself  suggesting  improvements  upon  the 
vocal  selections  of  cherubim  and  seraphim!  Impress 
the  idea  upon  these  gentry  with  warmth — and — with 

—oil! 

*   *   * 

The  ideal  hero  of  fiction,  you  say,  is  Capt.  D'Artag- 
nan,  first  name  unknown,  one  time  cadet  in  the  Re- 
serves of  M.  de  Troisville's  company  of  the  King's 
Guards,  intrusted  with  the  care  of  the  honor  and 
safety  of  His  Majesty,  Louis  XIV.  Very  well;  he  is 
a  noble  gentleman;  the  choice  does  honor  to  your 
heart,  mind  and  soul;  take  him  and  hold  the  remem- 
brance of  his  courage,  loyalty,  adroitness  and  splen- 
did endurance  with  hooks  of  steel.  For  myself, 
while  yielding  to  none  who  honor  the  great  D'Artag- 
nan,  yet  I  march  under  the  flag  of  the  Sieur  Bussy 
d'Amboise,  a  proud  Clermont,  of  blood  royal  in 
the  reign  of  Henry  III.,  who  shed  luster  upon  a 
court  that  was  edified  by  the  wisdom  of  M.  Chicot, 
the  "King's  Brother,"  the  incomparable  jester  and 
philosopher,  who  would  have  himself  exceeded  all 
heroes  except  that  he  despised  the  actors  and  the 
audience  of  the  world's  theater  and  performed  val- 
iant feats  only  that  he  might  hang  his  cap  and  bells 
upon  the  achievements  in  ridicule. 

Can  it  be  improper  to  compare  D'Artagnan  and 
Bussy — when  the  intention  is  wholly  respectful  and 
the  motive  pure?     If  a  single  protest  is  heard,  there 

82 


ABOUT     THE     HEROES 


will  be  an  end  to  this  paper  now — at  once.  There 
are  some  comparisons  that  strengthen  both  candi- 
dates. For,  we  must  consider  the  extent  of  the  thea- 
ter and  the  stage,  the  space  of  time  covering  the 
achievements,  the  varying  conditions,  lights  and  com- 
plexities. As,  for  instance,  the  very  atmosphere  in 
which  these  two  heroes  moved,  the  accompaniment 
of  manner  which  we  call  the  "air"  of  the  histories, 
and  which  are  markedly  different.  The  contrast  of 
breeding,  quality  and  refinement  between  Bussy  and 
D'Artagnan  is  as  great  as  that  which  distinguishes 
Mercutio  from  the  keen  M.  Chicot.  Yet  each  was 
his  own  ideal  type.  Birth  and  the  superior  privi- 
leges of  the  haute  noblesse  conferred  upon  the  Sieur 
Bussy  the  splendid  air  of  its  own  sufficient  prestige; 
the  lack  of  these  require  of  D'Artagnan  that  his  in- 
telligence, courage  and  loyal  devotion  should  yet 
seem  to  yield  something  of  their  greatness  in  the 
submission  that  the  man  was  compelled  to  pay  to 
the  master.  True,  this  attitude  was  atoned  for  on 
occasion  by  blunt  boldness,  but  the  abased  position 
and  the  lack  of  subtle  distinction  of  air  and  mind  of 
the  noble,  forbade  to  the  Fourth  Mousquetaire  the 
last  gracious  touch  of  a  Bayard  of  heroism.  But  the 
vulgarity  was  itself  heroic. 


Compare  the  first  appearance  of  the  great  Gascon 
at  the  Hotel  de  Troisville,  or  even  his  manner  and  at- 
titude toward  the  King  when  he  sought  to  warn  that 
monarch  against  forgetfulness  of  loyalty  proved, 
with  the  haughty  insolence  of  indomitable  spirit  in 
which  Bussy  threw  back  to  Henry  the  shuttle  of  dis- 
favor  on   the   night   of  that    remarkable    wedding   of 


THE     DELICIOUS    VICE 

St.  Luc  with  the  piquant  little  page  soubrette,  Jeanne 
de  Brissac. 

D'Artagnan's  air  to  his  King  has  its  pathos.  It 
seems  to  say:  "I  speak  bluntly,  sire,  knowing  that 
my  life  is  yours  and  yet  feeling  that  it  is  too  obscure 
to  provoke  your  vengeance."  A  very  hard  draught 
for  a  man  of  fire  and  fearlessness  to  take  without 
a  gulp.  But  into  Bussy's  manner  toward  his  King 
there  was  this  flash  of  lightning  from  Olympus:  "My 
life,  sire,  is  yours,  as  my  King,  to  take  or  leave;  but 
not  even  you  may  dare  to  think  of  taking  the  life  of 
Bussy  with  the  dust  of  least  reproach  upon  it.  My 
life  you  may  blow  out;  my  honor  you  do  not  dare  ap- 
proach to  question!" 

There  are  advantages  in  being  a  gentleman,  which 
can  not  be  denied.  One  is  that  it  commands  credit 
in  the  King's  presence  as  well  as  at  the  tailor's. 

It  is  interesting  to  compare  both  these  attitudes 
with  that  of  "Athos,"  the  Count  de  la  Fere,  toward 
the  King.  He  was  lacking  in  the  irresistibly  fierce 
insolence  of  Bussy  and  in  the  abasement  of  D'Artag- 
nan;  it  was  melancholy,  patient,  persistent  and  terri- 
ble in  its  restrained  calmness.  How  narrowly  he 
just  escaped  true  greatness.  I  would  no  more  cast 
reproaches  upon  that  noble  gentleman  than  I  would 
upon  my  grandmother;  but  he — was — a — trifle — seri- 
ous, wasn't  he?  He  was  brave,  prompt,  resourceful, 
splendid,  and,  at  need,  gingerish  as  the  best  colt  in 
the  paddock.  It  is  the  deuce's  own  pity  for  a  man 
to  be  born  to  too  much  seriousness.  Do  you  know 
— and  as  I  love  my  country,  I  mean  it  in  honest  re- 
spect— that  I  sometimes  think  that  the  gentleness 
and  melancholy  of  Athos  somehow  suggests  a  bit 
of  distrust.  One  is  almost  terrified  at  times  lest  he 
may  begin  the  Hamlet  controversies.     You  feel  that 

84 


ABOUT     THE     HEROES 


if  he  committed  a  murder  by  mistake  you  are  not 
absolutely  sure  he  wouldn't  take  a  turn  with  Re- 
morse. Not  so  Bussy;  he  would  throw  the  mistake 
in  with  good  will  and  not  create  worry  about  it. 
Hang  it  all,  if  the  necessary  business  of  murder  is  to 
halt  upon  the  shuffling  accident  of  mistake,  we  may 
as  well  sell  out  the  hero  business  and  rent  the  shop. 
It  would  be  down  to  the  level  of  Hamlet  in  no  time. 
Unless,  of  course,  the  hero  took  the  view  of  it  that 
Nero  adopted.  It  is  improbable  that  Nero  inherited 
the  gift  of  natural  remorse;  but  he  cultivated  one  and 
seemed  to  do  well  with  it.  He  used  to  reflect  upon 
his  mother  and  his  wife,  both  of  whom  he  had  af- 
fectionately murdered,  and  justified  himself  by  de- 
claring that  a  great  artist,  who  was  also  the  Roman 
Emperor,  would  be  lacking  in  breadth  of  emotional 
experience  and  retrospective  wisdom,  unless  he  knew 
the  melancholy  of  a  two-pronged  family  remorse. 
And  from  Nero's  standpoint  it  was  one  of  the  best 
thoughts  that  he  ever  formulated  into  language. 


To  return  to  Bussy  and  D'Artagnan.  In  courage 
they  were  Hector  and  Achilles.  You  remember  the 
champagne  picnic  before  the  bastion  St.  Gervais  at 
the  siege  of  St.  Rochelle?  What  light-hearted 
gayety  amid  the  flying  missiles  of  the  arquebusiers! 
Yet,  do  not  forget  that — ignoring  the  lacquey — 
there  were  four  of  them,  and  that  his  Eminence,  the 
Cardinal  Duke,  had  said  the  four  of  them  were 
equal  to  a  thousand  men!  If  you  have  enough 
knowledge  of  human  nature  to  understand  the  fine 
game  of  baseball,  and  have  at  any  time  scraped  ac- 
quaintance with  the  interesting  mathematical  doc- 
trine of  progressive  permutations,  you  will  see,  when 

85 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 

four  men  equal  to  a  thousand  are  under  the  eyes  of 
each  other,  and  of  the  garrison  in  the  fort,  that  the 
whole  arsenal  of  logarithms  would  give  out  before 
you  could  compute  the  permutative  possibilities  of 
the  courage  that  would  be  refracted,  reflected,  com- 
pounded and  concentrated  by  all  there,  each  giving 
courage  to  and  receiving  courage  from  each  and  all 
the  others.  It  makes  my  head  ache  to  think  of  it. 
I  feel  as  if  I  could  be  brave  myself. 

Certainly  they  were  that  day.  To  the  bitter  end 
of  finishing  the  meal;  and  they  confessed  the  added 
courage  by  gamboling  like  boys  amid  awful  thunders 
of  the  arquebuses,  which  made  a  rumble  in  their 
time  like  their  successors,  the  omnibuses,  still  make 
to  this  day  on  the  granite  streets  of  cities  populated 
by  deaf  folks. 

There  never  was  more  of  a  gay,  lilting,  impudent 
courage  than  those  four  mousquetaires  displayed 
with  such  splendid  coolness  and  spirit. 

But  compare  it  with  the  fight  which  Bussy  made, 
single-handed,  against  the  assassins  hired  by  Mon- 
sereau  and  authorized  by  that  effeminate  fop,  the 
Due  D'Anjou.  Of  course  you  remember  it.  Let 
me  pay  you  the  affectionate  compliment  of  presum- 
ing that  you  have  read  "La  Dame  de  Monsereau," 
often  translated  under  the  English  title,  "Chicot,  the 
Jester,"  that  almost  incomparable  novel  of  historical 
romance,  by  M.  Dumas.  If,  through  some  accident  or 
even  through  lack  of  culture,  you  have  failed  to  do  so, 
pray  do  not  admit  it.  Conceal  your  blemish  and 
remedy  the  matter  at  once.  At  least,  seem  to  de- 
serve respect  and  confidence,  and  appear  to  be  a 
worthy  novel-reader  if  actually  you  are  not.  There 
is  a  novel  that,  I  assure  you  on  my  honor,  is  as  good 
as   the   "Three   Guardsmen;"   but — oh! — so — much — 

86 


ABOUT     THE    HEROES 


shorter;  the  pity  of  it,  too! — oh,  the  pity  of  it!  On 
the  second  reading — now,  let  us  speak  with  frank 
conservatism — on  the  second  reading  of  it,  I  give 
you  my  word,  man  to  man,  I  dreaded  to  turn  every 
page,  because  it  brought  the  end  nearer.  If  it  had 
been  granted  to  me  to  have  one  wish  fulfilled  that 
fine  winter  night,  I  should  have  said  with  humility: 
"Beneficent  Power,  string  it  out  by  nine  more  vol- 
umes, presto  me  here  a  fresh  box  of  cigars,  and  the 
account    of    your    kindness,     and     my    gratitude    is 

closed." 

♦   ♦   * 

If  the  publisher  of  this  series  did  not  have  such 
absurd  sensitiveness  about  the  value  of  space  and 
such  pitifully  small  ideas  about  the  nobility  of  novels, 
I  should  like  to  write  at  least  twenty  pages  about 
"Chicot."  There  are  books  that  none  of  us  ever 
put  down  in  our  lists  of  great  books,  and  yet  which 
we  think  more  of  and  delight  more  in  than  all  the 
great  guns.  Not  one  of  the  friends  I've  loved  so 
long  and  well  has  been  President  of  the  United 
States,  but  I  wouldn't  give  one  of  them  for  all  the 
Presidents.  Just  across  the  hall  at  this  minute  I  can 
hear  the  frightful  din  of  war — shells  whistling  and 
moaning,  bullets  s-e-o-uing,  the  shrieks  of  the  dying 
and  wounded — Merciful  Heaven!  the  "Don  Juan  of 
Asturia"  has  just  blown  up  in  Manila  Bay  with  an 
awful  roar — again!  Again,  as  I'm  a  living  man,  just 
as  she  has  blown  up  every  day,  and  several  times 
every  day,  since  May  1,  1898.  There  are  two  war- 
riors over  in  the  play-room,  drenched  with  imagi- 
nary gore,  immersed  in  the  tender  grace  of  bestowing 
chastening  death  and  destruction  upon  the  Spanish 
foe.  Don't  I  know  that  they  rank  somewhat  below 
Admiral  Dewey  as  heroes?     But  do  you  suppose  that 

87 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 

their  father  would  swap  them  for  Admiral  Dewey 
and  all  the  rainbow  glories  that  fine  old  Yankee  sea- 
dog  ever  will  enjoy — long  may  he  live  to  enjoy  them 
all! — do  you  think  so?  Of  course  not!  You  know 
perfectly  well  that  his — wife — wouldn't — let — himl 

I  would  not  wound  the  susceptibilities  of  any  read- 
er; but  speaking  for  myself — "Chicot"  being  beloved 
of  my  heart — if  there  was  a  mean  man,  living  in  a 
mean  street,  who  had  the  last  volume  of  "Chicot"  in 
existence,  I  would  pour  out  my  library's  last  heart's 
blood  to  get  it.  He  could  have  all  of  Scott  but 
"Ivanhoe,"  all  of  Dickens  but  "Copperfield,"  all  of 
Hugo  but  "Les  Miserables,"  cords  of  Fielding,  Mar- 
ryat,  Richardson,  Reynolds,  Eliot,  Smollet,  a  whole 
ton  of  German  translations — by  George!  he  could 
leave  me  a  poor  old  despoiled,  destitute  and  ruined 
book-owner  in  things  that  folks  buy  in  costly  bind- 
ings for  the  sake  of  vanity  and  the  deception  of  those 
who  also  deceive  them  in  turn. 

Brother,  "Chicot"  is  a  book  you  lend  only  to  your 
dearest  friend,  and  then  remind  him  next  day  that 

he  hasn't  sent  it  back. 

*   *   * 

Now,  as  to  Bussy's  great  fight.  He  had  gone  to 
the  house  of  Madame  Diana  de  Monsereau.  I  am 
not  au  fait  upon  French  social  customs,  but  let  us 
presume  his  being  there  was  entirely  proper,  because 
that  excellent  lady  was  glad  to  see  him.  He  was  set 
upon  by  her  husband,  M.  de  Monsereau,  with  fifteen 
hired  assassins.  Outside,  the  Due  D'Anjou  and  some 
others  of  assassins  were  in  hiding  to  make  sure  that 
Monsereau  killed  Bussy,  and  that  somebody  killed 
Monsereau!  There's  a  "situation"  for  you,  double- 
edged  treachery  against — love  and  innocence,  let  us 
say. 


ABOUT     THE     HEROES 


Bussy  is  in  the  house  with  Madame.  His  friend, 
St.  Luc,  is  with  him;  also  his  lacquey  and  body- 
physician,  the  faithful  Remy.  Bang!  the  doors  are 
broken  in,  and  the  assassins  penetrate  up  the  stair- 
way. The  brave  Bussy  confides  Diana  to  St.  Luc 
and  Remy,  and,  hastily  throwing  up  a  barricade  of 
tables  and  chairs  near  the  door  of  the  apartment, 
draws  his  sword.  Then,  ye  friends  of  sudden  death 
and  valorous  exercise,  began  a  surfeit  of  joy.  Mon- 
sereau  and  his  assassins  numbered  sixteen.  In  less 
than  three  moderate  paragraphs  Bussy's  sword,  play- 
ing like  avenging  lightning,  had  struck  fatality  to 
seven.  Even  then,  with  every  wrist  going,  he  re- 
flected, with  sublime  calculation:  "I  can  kill  five 
more,  because  I  can  fight  with  all  my  vigor  ten  minutes 
longer!"  After  that?  Bussy  could  see  no  further 
— there  spoke  fate! — you  feel  he  is  to  die.  Once 
more  the  leaping  steel  point,  the  shrill  death  cry, 
the  miraculous  parry.  The  villain,  Monsereau,  draws 
his  pistol.  Bussy,  who  is  fighting  half  a  dozen 
swordsmen,  can  even  see  the  cowardly  purpose;  he 
watches;  he — dodges — the — bullets! — by  watching  the 
aim — 

"Ye  sons  of  France,  behold  the  glory!" 

He  thrusts,  parries  and  swings  the  sword  as  a 
falchion.  Suddenly  a  pistol  ball  snaps  the  blade  off 
six  inches  from  the  hilt.  Bussy  picks  up  the  blade 
and  in  an  instant  splices — it — to — the — hilt — with — 
his — handkerchief!  Oh,  good  sword  of  the  good 
swordsman!  it  drinks  the  blood  of  three  more  before 
it — bends — and — loosens — under — the — strain !  Bussy 
is  shot  in  the  thigh;  Monsereau  is  upon  him;  the  good 
Remy,  lying  almost  lifeless  from  a  bullet  wound  re- 
ceived at  the  outset,  thrusts  a  rapier  to  Bussy's 
grasp  with  a  last  effort.     Bussy  springs  upon  Mon- 

89 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 

sereau  with  the  great  bound  of  a  panther  and  pins — 
the  —  son  —  of  —  a  —  gun  —  to  —  the  —  floor  — 
with — the — rapier — and — watches — him — die! 

You  can  feel  faint  for  joy  at  that  passage  for  a 
good  dozen  readings,  if  you  are  appreciative.  Poor 
Bussy,  faint  from  wounds  and  blood-letting,  retreats 
valiantly  to  a  closet  window  step  by  step  and  drops 
out,  leaving  Monsereau  spitted,  like  a  black  spider, 
dead  on  the  floor.  Here  hope  and  expectation  are 
drawn  out  in  your  breast  like  chewing  gum  stretched 
to  the  last  shred  of  tenuation.  At  this  point  I  firm- 
ly believed  that  Bussy  would  escape.  I  feel  sorry 
for  the  reader  who  does  not.  You  just  naturally 
argue  that  the  faithful  Remy  will  surely  reach  him 
and  rub  him  with  the  balsam.  That  balsam  of  Du- 
mas! The  same  that  D'Artagnan's  mother  gave  him 
when  he  rode  away  on  the  yellow  horse,  and  which 
cured  so  many  heroes  hurt  to  the  last  gasp.  That 
miraculous  balsam,  which  would  make  doctors  and 
surgeons  sing  small  today  if  they  had  not  suppressed 
it  from  the  materia  medica.  May  be  they  can  silence 
their  consciences  by  the  reflection  that  they  sup- 
pressed it  to  enhance  the  value  and  necessity  of  their 
own  personal  services.  But  let  them  look  at  the 
death  rate  and  shudder.  I  had  confidence  in  Remy 
and  the  balsam,  but  he  could  not  get  there  in  time. 
Then,  it  was  forgone  that  Bussy  must  die.  Like  Mer- 
cutio,  he  was  too  brilliant  to  live.  Depend  upon  it, 
these  wizards  of  story  tellers  know  when  the  knell 
of  fate  rings  much  sooner  than  we  halting  readers  do. 

Bussy  drops  from  the  closet  window  upon  an  iron 
fence  that  surrounded  the  park  and  was  impaled  up- 
on the  dreadful  pickets!  Even  then  for  another  mo- 
ment you  can  cherish  a  hope  that  he  may  escape  after 
all.     Suspended  there  and  growing  weaker,  he  hears 


ABOUT    THE    HEROES 


footsteps  approaching.  Is  it  a  rescuing  friend?  He 
calls  out — and  a  dagger  stroke  from  the  hand  of 
D'Anjou,  his  Judas  master,  finds  his  heart.  That's  the 
way  Bussy  died.  No  man  is  proof  against  the  dagger 
stroke  of  treachery.  Bussy  was  powerful  and  the 
due  jealous. 

Diana  has  been  carried  off  safely  by  the  trust- 
worthy St.  Luc.  She  must  have  died  of  grief  if  she 
had  not  been  kept  alive  to  be  the  instrument  of  re- 
tributive justice.  (In  the  sequal  you  will  find  that 
this  Queen  of  Hearts  descended  upon  the  ignoble 
due  at  the  proper  time  like  a  thousand  of  brick  and 
took  the  last  trick  of  justice.) 


The  extraordinary  description  of  Bussy's  fight  is 
beyond  everything.  You  gallop  along  as  if  in  a 
whirlwind,  and  it  is  only  in  cooler  moments  that  you 
discover  he  killed  about  twelve  rascals  with  his  own 
good  arm.  It  seems  impossible;  the  scientific,  care- 
ful readers  have  been  known  to  declare  it  impossi- 
ble and  sneer  at  it  with  laughter.  I  trust  every  novel 
reader  respects  scientific  folks  as  he  should;  but 
science  is  not  everything.  Our  scientific  friends  have 
contended  that  the  whale  did  not  engulf  Jonah;  that 
the  sun  did  not  pause  over  the  vale  of  Askelon;  that 
Baron  Munchausen's  horse  did  not  hang  to  the 
steeple  by  his  bridle;  that  the  beanstalk  could  not 
have  supported  a  stout  lad  like  Jack;  that  General 
Monk  was  not  sent  to  Holland  in  a  cage;  that  Remus 
and  Romulus  had  not  a  devoted  lady  wolf  for  a  step- 
mother; in  fact,  that  loads  of  things,  of  which  the 
most  undeniable  proof  exists  in  plain  print  all  over 
the    world,    never    were    done    or    never    happened. 

91 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 

Bussy  was  killed,  Remy  was  killed  later,  Diana  died 
in  performing  her  destiny,  St.  Luc  was  killed.  No- 
body left  to  make  affidavits,  except  M.  Dumas;  in 
his  lifetime  nobody  questioned  it;  he  is  now  dead 
and  unable  to  depose;  whereupon  the  scientists  sniff 
scornfully  and  deny.  I  hope  I  shall  always  con- 
tinue to  respect  science  in  its  true  offices,  but,  breth- 
ren, are  there  not  times  when — science — makes — you 
— ^just — a — little — tired? 

Heroes!     D'Artagnan     or     Bussy?     Choose,     good 
friends,  freely;  as  freely  let  me  have  my  Bussy, 


VIII 

HEROINES 

A   SUBJECT   ALMOST   WITHOUT   AN    OBJECT 

—WHY  THERE  ARE  FEW  HEROINES 

FOR  MEN. 

NOTWITHSTANDING  the  subject,  there  are 
almost  no  heroines  in  novels.  There  are  im- 
possibly good  women,  absurdly  patient  and 
brave  women,  but  few  heroines  as  the  convention 
of  worldly  thinking  demands  heroines.  There  is  an 
endless  train  of  what  Thackeray  so  aptly  described 
as  "pale,  pious,  and  pulmonary  ladies"  who  snivel 
and  snuffle  and  sigh  and  linger  irresolutely  under 
many  trials  which  a  little  common  sense  would  dis- 
solve; but  they  are  pathological  heroines.  "Little 
Nell,"  "Little  Eva,"  and  their  married  sisters  are  un- 
questionable in  morals,  purpose  and  faith;  but  oh! 
how — they — do — try — the — nerves!  How  brave  and 
noble  was  Jennie  Deans,  but  how  thick-headed  was 
the  dear  lass! 

These  women  who  are  merely  good,  and  enforce 
it  by  turning  on  the  faucet  of  tears,  or  by  old-fash- 
ioned obstinacy,  or  stupidity  of  purpose,  can  scarcely 
be  called  heroines  by  the  canons  of  understood 
definition.  On  the  other  hand,  the  conventions  do 
not  permit  us  to  describe  as  a  heroine  any  lady  who 
has  what  is  nowadays  technically  called  "a  past." 
The  very  best  men  in  the  world  find  splendid  hero- 
ism and  virtue  in  Tess  I'Durbeyfield.  There  is  no- 
where an  honest,  strong,  good  man,  full  of  weak- 
ness, though  he  may  be,  scarred  so  much,  however 

93 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 

with  fault,  who  does  not  read  St.  John  vH.,  3-11, 
with  sympathy,  reverence  and  Amen!  The  infalli- 
ble critics  can  prove  to  a  hair  that  this  passage  is  an 
interpolation.  An  interpolation  in  that  sense  means 
something  inserted  to  deceive  or  defraud;  a  for- 
gery. How  can  you  defraud  or  deceive  anybody  by 
the  interpolation  of  pure  gold  with  pure  gold?  How 
can  that  be  a  forgery  which  hurts  nobody,  but  gives 
to  everybody  more  value  in  the  thing  uttered?  If 
John  vii.,  3-11,  is  an  interpolation  let  us  hope  Heaven 
has  long  ago  blessed  the  interpolator.  Does  any- 
body— even  the  infallible  critic — contend  that  Jesus 
would  not  have  so  said  and  done  if  the  woman  had 
been  brought  to  Him?  Was  that  not  the  very 
flower  and  savor  and  soul  of  His  teaching?  Would 
He  have  said  or  done  otherwise?  If  the  Ten  Com- 
mandments were  lost  utterly  from  among  men  there 
would  yet  remain  these  four  greater: 

"Do  unto  others  as  ye  would  they  should  do  unto 
you." 

"Suffer  little  children  to  come  unto  me." 

"Go  and  sin  no  more." 

"Father,  forgive  them,  for  they  know  not  what 
they  do." 

My  lords  and  ladies,  men  and  women,  the  Ten 
Commandments,  by  the  side  of  these  sighs  of  gen- 
tleness, are  the  Police  Court  and  the  Criminal  Code, 
which  are  intended  to  pay  cruelty  off  in  punishment. 
These  Four  are  the  tears  with  which  sympathy 
soothes  the  wounds  of  suffering.  Blessed  interpola- 
tor of  St.  John ! 

There  are  three  marvelous  novels  in  the  Bible — 
not  Novels  in  the  sense  of  fiction,  but  in  the  sense 
of  vivid,  living  narratives  of  human  emotions  and  of 
events.     A  million  Novels  rest  on  those  nine  verses 


HEROINES 


in  John,  and  the  nine  verses  are  better  than  the  mil- 
lion books.  The  story  of  David  and  Uriah's  wife  is 
in  a  similar  catalogue  as  regards  quality  and  useful- 
ness; the  story  of  Esther  is  a  pearl  of  great  beauty. 


But  to  return  to  heroines,  let  us  make  a  volte  face* 
There  is  an  old  story  of  the  lady  who  wrote  rather 
irritably  to  Thackeray,  asking,  curtly,  why  all  the 
good  women  he  created  were  fools  and  the  bright 
women  all  bad.  "The  same  complaint,"  he  answered, 
"has  been  made,  Madame,  of  God  and  Shakespeare, 
and  as  neither  has  given  explanation  I  can  not  pre- 
sume to  attempt  one."  It  was  curt  and  severe,  and, 
of  course,  Thackeray  did  not  write  it  as  it  would  ap- 
pear, even  though  he  may  have  said  as  much  jestingly 
to  some  intimate  who  understood  the  epigram;  but 
was  not  the  question  rather  impudently  intrusive? 
Thackeray,  you  remember,  was  the  "seared  cynic" 
who  created  Caroline  Gann,  the  gentle,  beautiful, 
glorious  "Little  Sister,"  the  staunch,  pure-hearted 
woman  whose  character  not  even  the  perfect  scoun- 
drelism  of  Dr.  George  Brand  Firmin  could  tarnish 
or  disturb.  If  there  are  heroines,  surely  she  has 
her  place  high  amid  the  noble  group! 

There  are  plenty  of  intelligent  persons  sacramentally 
wedded  to  mere  conventions  of  good  and  bad.  You 
could  never  persuade  them  that  Rebecca  Sharp — that 
most  perfect  daughter  of  Thackeray's  mind — was  a 
heroine.  But  of  course  she  was.  In  that  world 
wherein  she  was  cast  to  live  she  was  indubitably,  in- 
comparably, the  very  best  of  all  the  inhabitants  to 
whom  you  are  intimately  introduced.  Capt.  Dobbin? 
Oh,  no,  I  am  not  forgetting  good  Old  Dob.  Of  all  the 
social  door  mats  that  ever  I  wiped  my  feet  upon  Old 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 

Dob  is  certainly  the  cleanest,  most  patient,  serviceable 
and  unrevolutionary.  But,  just  a  door  mat,  with  the 
virtues  and  attractions  of  that  useful  article  of  furniture 
— the  sublime,  immortal  prig  of  all  the  ages,  or  you 
can  take  the  head  of  any  novel-reader  under  thirty 
for  a  football.  You  may  have  known  many  women, 
from  Bernadettes  of  Massavielle  to  Borgias  of  scant 
neighborhoods,  but  you  know  you  never  knew  one  who 
would  marry  Old  Dob,  except  as  that  emotional  dishrag, 
Amelia,  married  him — as  the  Last  Chance  on  the 
stretching  high-road  of  uncertain  years.  No  girl  ever 
willingly  marries  door  mats.  She  just  wipes  her  feet 
on  them  and  passes  on  into  the  drawing  room  looking 
for  the  Prince.  It  seems  to  me  one  of  the  triumphant 
proofs  of  Becky  as  a  heroine  that  she  did  not  marry 
Captain  Dobbin.  She  might  have  done  it  any  day  by 
crooking  her  little  finger  at  him — but  she  didn't. 

Madame  Becky,  that  smart  daughter  of  an  alcoholic 
gentleman  artist  and  of  his  lady  of  the  French  ballet, 
inherited  the  perfect  non-moral  morality  of  the  artist 
blood  that  sang  mercurially  through  her  veins.  How 
could  she,  therefore,  how  could  she,  being  non-moral, 
be  immoral?  It  is  clear  nonsense.  But  she  did 
possess  the  instinctive  artist  morality  of  unerring  taste 
for  selection  in  choice.  Examine  the  facts  meticu- 
lously— meticulously — and  observe  how  carefully  she 
selected  that  best  in  all  that  worst  she  moved  among. 


In  the  will  I  shall  some  day  leave  behind  me  there  will 
be  devised,  in  primogenitural  trust  forever,  the  priceless 
treasure  of  conviction  that  Becky  was  innocent  of  Lord 
Steyne.  I  leave  it  to  any  gentleman  who  has  had  the 
great  opportunity  to  look  in  familiarly  upon  the  outer 
and  upper  fringes  of  the  world  of  unclassed  and  preda- 

96 


HEROINES 


tory  women  and  the  noble  lords  that  abound  therea- 
mong.  Let  him  read  over  again  that  famous  scene 
where  Becky  writes  her  scorn  upon  Steyne's  forehead 
in  the  noble  blood  of  that  aristocratic  wolf.  Then  let 
him  give  his  decision,  as  an  honest  juryman  upon  his 
oath,  whether  he  is  convinced  that  the  most  noble 
Marquis  was  raging  because  he  was  losing  a  woman,  or 
from  the  discovery  that  he  was  one  of  two  dupes 
facing  each  other,  and  that  he  was  the  fool  who  had 
paid  for  both  and  had  had  "no  run  for  his  money!" 
Marquises  of  Steyne  do  not  resent  sentimental  losses 
— they  can  be  hurt  only  in  their  sportsmanship. 

You  may  begin  with  the  Misses  Pinkerton  (in  whose 
select  school  Becky  absorbed  the  intricate  hypocrisies 
and  saturated  snobbery  of  the  highest  English  society) 
and  follow  her  through  all  the  little  and  big  turmoils  of 
her  life,  meeting  on  the  way  of  it  all  the  elaborated 
differentials  of  the  country-gentleman  and  lady  tribe 
of  Crawley,  the  line  officers  and  bemedalled  generals  of 
the  army  (except  honest  O'Dowd  and  his  lady),  the 
most  noble  Marquis  and  his  shadowy  and  resigned 
Marchioness,  the  R — y — 1  P — rs — n — ge  himself — even 
down  to  the  tuft-hunters  Punter  and  Loder — and  if 
Becky  is  not  superior  to  every  man  and  woman  of 
them  in  every  personal  trait  and  grace  that  calls  for 
admiration — then,  why,  by  George!  do  you  take  such 
an  interest,  such  an  undying  interest,  in  her?  You 
invariably  take  the  greatest  interest  in  the  best  char- 
acter in  a  story — unless  it's  too  good  and  gets  "sweety" 
and  "sticky"  and  so  sours  on  your  philosophical 
stomach.  You  can't  possibly  take  any  interest  in 
Dobbin — you  just  naturally,  emphatically,  and  in  the 
most  unreflecting  way  in  the  world,  say  "Oh,  d — n 
Dobbin!"  and  go  right  ahead  after  somebody  else.  I 
don't  say  Becky  was  all  that  a  perfect  Sunday  School 


THE    DELICIOUS    VICE 


teacher  should  have  been,  but  in  the  group  in  which 
she  was  born  to  move  she  smells  cleaner  than  the  whole 
raft  of  them — to  me. 


Thackeray  was,  next  to  Shakespeare,  the  writer  most 
wonderfully  combined  of  instinct  and  reason  that 
English  literature  of  grace  has  produced.  He  has  been 
compared  with  the  Frenchman,  Balzac.  Since  I  have 
no  desire  to  provoke  squabbles  about  favorite  authors, 
let  us  merely  definitely  agree  that  such  a  comparison 
is  absurd  and  pass  on.  Because  you  must  have  noticed 
that  Balzac  was  often  feeble  in  his  reason  and  couldn't 
make  it  keep  step  with  his  instinct,  while  in  Thackeray 
they  both  step  together  like  the  Siamese  twins.  It 
is  a  very  striking  fact,  indeed,  that  during  all  Becky's 
intense  early  experiences  with  the  great  world,  Thacke- 
ray does  not  make  her  guilty.  All  the  circumstances 
of  that  world  were  guilty  and  she  is  placed  amidst  the 
circumstances;  but  that  is  all. 

"The  ladies  in  the  drawing  room,"  said  one  lady  to 
Thackeray,  when  "Vanity  Fair"  in  monthly  parts 
publishing  had  just  reached  the  catastrophe  of  Rawdon, 
Rebecca,  old  Steyne  and  the  bracelet — "The  ladies 
have  been  discussing  Becky  Sharpe  and  they  all  agree 
that  she  was  guilty.     May  I  ask  if  we  guessed  rightly?" 

"I  am  sure  I  don't  know,"  replied  the  "seared 
cynic,"  mischievously.  "I  am  only  a  man  and  I 
haven't  been  able  to  make  up  my  mind  on  that  point. 
But  if  the  ladies  agree  I  fear  it  may  be  true — you  must 
understand  your  sex  much  better  than  we  men!" 

That  is  proof  that  she  was  not  guilty  with  Steyne. 
But  straightway  then,  Thackeray  starts  out  to  make 
her  guilty  with  others.  It  is  so  much  the  more  proof 
of  her  previous  innocence  that,  incomparable  artist  as 

98 


HEROINES 


he  was  in  showing  human  character,  he  recognized  that 
he  could  convince  the  reader  of  her  guilt  only  by  dis- 
integrating her,  whipping  himself  meanwhile  into  a 
ceaseless  rage  of  vulgar  abuse  of  her,  a  thing  of  which 
Thackeray  was  seldom  guilty.  But  it  was  not  really 
Becky  that  became  guilty — it  was  the  woman  that 
English  society  and  Thackeray  remorselessly  made  of 
her.  I  wouldn't  be  a  lawyer  for  a  wagon  load  of 
diamonds,  but  if  I  had  had  to  be  a  lawyer  I  should  have 
preferred  to  be  a  solicitor  at  the  London  bar  in  1817 
to  write  the  brief  for  the  respondent  in  the  celebrated 
divorce  case  of  Crawley  vs.  Crawley.  Against  the 
back-ground  of  the  world  she  lived  in  Becky  could 
have  been  painted  as  meekly  white  and  beautiful  as 
that  lovely  old  picture  of  St.  Cecilia  at  the  Choir 
Organ. 

Perhaps  Becky  was  not  strictly  a  heroine;  but  she 
was  a  honey. 


Men  can  not  "create"  heroines  in  the  sense  of 
shadowing  forth  what  they  conceive  to  be  the  glory, 
beauty,  courage  and  splendor  of  womanly  character. 
It  is  the  indescribable  sum  of  womanhood  corres" 
ponding  to  the  unutterable  name  of  God.  The  true 
man's  love  of  woman  is  a  spirit  sense  attending  upon 
the  actual  senses  of  seeing,  hearing,  feeling,  tasting 
and  smelling.  The  woman  he  loves  enters  into  every 
one  of  these  senses  and  thus  is  impounded  five-fold 
upon  that  union  of  all  of  them,  which,  together  with 
the  miracle  of  mind,  composes  what  we  call  the  hu- 
man soul  as  a  divine  essence.  She  is  attached  to 
every  religion,  yet  enters  with  authority  into  none. 
She  is  first  at  its  birth,  the  last  to  stay  weeping  at 
its  death.     In  every  great  novel  a  heroine,  unnamed, 

99 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 

unspoken,  undescribed,  hovers  throughout  like  an 
essence.  The  heroism  of  woman  is  her  privacy. 
There  is  to  me  no  more  wonderful,  philosophical, 
psychological  and  delicate  triumph  of  literary  art  in 
existence  than  the  few  chapters  in  "Quo  Vadis"  in 
which  that  great  introspective  genius,  Sienkiewicz, 
sets  forth  the  growth  of  the  spell  of  love  with  which 
Lygia  has  encompassed  Vinicius,  and  the  singular 
development  and  progress  of  the  emotion  through 
which  Vinicius  is  finally  immersed  in  human  love  of 
Lygia  and  in  the  Christian  reverence  of  her  spiritual 
purity  at  the  same  time.  It  is  the  miracle  of  soul  in 
sex. 

Every  clean-hearted  youth  that  has  had  the  happi- 
ness to  marry  a  good  woman — and,  thank  Heaven, 
clean  youths  and  good  women  are  thick  as  leaves  in 
Vallambrosa  in  this  sturdy  old  world  of  ours — every 
such  youth  has  had  his  day  of  holy  conversion,  his 
touch  of  the  wand  conferring  upon  him  the  miracle 
of  love,  and  he  has  been  a  better  and  wiser  man  for 
it.  Not  sense  love,  not  the  instinctive,  restless  love 
of  matter  for  matter,  but  the  love  that  descends  like 
the  dove  amid  radiance. 


We've  all  seen  that  bridal  couple;  she  is  as  pretty 
as  peaches;  he  is  as  proud  of  her  as  if  she  were  a 
splendid  race  horse;  he  glories  in  knowing  she  is 
lovely  and  accepts  the  admiration  offered  to  her  as 
a  tribute  to  his  own  judgment,  his  own  taste  and 
even  his  merit,  which  obtained  her.  There  is  a  cer- 
tain amount  of  silliness  in  her  which  he  soon  detects, 
a  touch  of  helplessness,  and  unsophistication  in 
knowledge  of  worldly  things  that  he  yet  feels  is 
mysteriously    guarded    against    intrusion    upon    and 

100 


HEROI NES 


which  makes  companionship  with  her  sometimes  irk- 
some. He  feels  superior  and  uncompensated;  from 
the  superb  isolation  of  his  greater  knowledge,  cour- 
age and  independence,  he  grants  to  her  a  certain 
tender  pity  and  protection;  he  admits  her  faith  and 
purity  and — er — but — you  see,  he  is  sorry  she  is  not 
quite  the  well  poised  and  noble  creature  he  is!  Mr. 
Youngwed  is  at  this  time  passing  through  the  men- 
tal digestive  process  of  feeling  his  oats.  He  is  all 
right,  though,  if  he  is  half  as  good  as  he  thinks  he  is. 
He  has  not  been  touched  by  the  live  wire  of  experi- 
ence— yet;  that's  all. 

Well,  in  the  course  of  human  events,  there  comes 
a  time  when  he  is  frightened  to  death,  then  greatly 
relieved  and  for  a  few  weeks  becomes  as  proud  as  if 
he  had  actually  provided  the  last  census  of  the 
United  States  with  most  of  the  material  contained 
in  it.  A  few  months  later,  when  the  feeble  whines 
and  howls  have  found  increased  vigor  of  utterance 
and  more  frequency  of  expression;  when  they  don't 
know  whether  Master  Jack  or  Miss  Jill  has  m.erely 
a  howling  spell  or  is  threatened  with  fatal  convul- 
sions; when  they  don't  know  whether  they  want  a 
dog-muzzle  or  a  doctor;  when  Mr.  Youngwed  has 
lost  his  sleep  and  his  temper,  together,  and  has  dis- 
played himself  with  spectacular  effect  as  a  brute, 
selfish,  irritable,  helpless,  resourceless  and  conquered 
— then — then,  my  dear  madame,  you  have  doubtless 
observed  him  decrease  in  self-estimated  size  like  a 
balloon  into  which  a  pin  has  been  introduced,  until  he 
looks,  in  fact,  like  Master  Frog  reduced  in  bulk  from 
the  bull-size,  to  which  he  aspired,  to  his  original  de- 
gree. 

At  that  time  Mrs.  Youngwed  is  very  busy  with 
little  Jack  or  Jill,  as  the  case  may  be.     Her  husband's 

101 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 

conduct  she  probably  regards  with  resignation  as 
the  first  heavy  burden  of  the  cross  she  is  expected 
to  bear.  She  does  not  reproach  him,  it  is  useless; 
she  has  perhaps  suspected  that  his  assumed  superior- 
ity would  not  stand  the  real  strain.  But,  he  is  the 
father  of  the  dear  baby  and,  for  that  precious  dar- 
ling's sake,  she  will  be  patient.  I  wonder  if  she 
feels  that  way?  She  has  every  right  to,  and,  for  one, 
I  say  that  I'll  be  hanged  if  I  find  any  fault  with  her 
if  she  does.  That  is  the  way  she  must  keep  human, 
and  so  balance  the  little  open  accoimts  that  married 
folks  ought  to  run  between  themselves  for  the  pur- 
pose of  keeping  cobwebs  and  mildew  off,  or  rather 
of  maintaining  their  lives  as  a  running  stream  in- 
stead of  a  stagnant  pond.  A  little  good  talking  back 
now  and  then  is  good  for  wives  and  married  men. 
Don't  be  afraid,  Mrs.  Youngwed;  and  when  the  very 
worst  has  come,  why  cry — at — him  I  One  tear  weighs 
more  and  will  hit  him  harder  than  an  ax.  In  the 
lachrymal  ducts  with  which  heaven  has  blessed  you, 
you  are  more  surely  protected  against  the  fires  of 
your  honest  indignation  than  you  are  by  the  fire  de- 
partment against  a  blaze  in  the  house.  And  be  pa- 
tient, also;  remember,  dear  sister,  that,  though  you 
can  cry,  he  has  a  gift — that — enables — him — to — 
swear!  You  and  other  wedded  wives  very  properly 
object  to  swearing,  but  you  will  doubtless  admit  that 
there  is  compensation  in  that  when  he  does  swear 
in  his  usual  good  form  you — never — feel — any — ap- 
prehension— about — the — state — of — his — health! 

This  natural  outburst  of  resentment  has  not  lasted 
three  minutes.  Mr.  Y.  has  returned  to  his  couch, 
sulky  and  ashamed.  He  pretends  to  sleep  ostenta- 
tiously; he — does — not  I  He  is  thinking  with  remark- 
able intensity  and  has  an  eye  open.     He  sees  the 


HEROINES 


slender  figxire  in  the  dim  light,  hanging  over  the  crib, 

he  hears  the  crooning,  he  begins  to  suspect  that  there 
is  an  alloy  in  his  godlikeness.  He  looks  to  earth, 
listens  to  the  thin,  wailing  cries,  wonders,  regrets, 
wearies,  sleeps.  At  that  moment  Mrs.  Y.  should 
fall  on  her  knees  and  rejoice.  She  would  if  she 
could  leave  young  Jack  or  Jill;  but  she  can't — she — 
never — can.  That's  what  sent  Mr.  Y.  to  sleep.  It 
is  just  as  well  perhaps  that  Mrs.  Y.  is  unobservant. 


A  miracle  is  happening  to  Mr.  Y.  In  an  hour  or 
two,  let  us  say,  there  is  a  new  vocal  alarm  from  the 
crib.  Almost  with  the  first  suspicion  of  fretfulness 
or  pain  the  mother  has  heard  it.  Heaven's  myster- 
ious telepathy  of  instinct  has  operated.  Between 
angels,  babies  and  mothers  the  distance  is  no  longer 
than  your  arm  can  reach.  They  understand,  feel 
and  hear  each  other,  and  are  linked  in  one  chain. 
So,  that,  when  Mr.  Y.  has  struggled  laboriously 
awake  and  wonders  if — that — child — is — going — to — 

howl — all .     Well,  he  goes  no  further.     In  the  dim 

light  he  sees  again  the  slender  figure  hanging  over 
the  crib,  he  hears  the  crooning  and  the  retreating 
sobs.  It  is  just  as  he  saw  and  heard  before  he  fell 
asleep.  No  complaints,  no  reproaches,  no  irritation. 
Oh,  what  a  brute  he  feels!  He  battles  with  his  rea- 
son and  his  bewilderment.  Had  he  fallen  asleep 
and  left  her  to  bear  that  strain;  or  has  she  gone 
anew  to  the  rescue,  while  he  slept  without  thought? 
Up  out  of  his  heart  the  tenderness  wells;  down  into 
his  mind  the  revelation  comes.  The  miracle  works. 
He  looks  and  listens.  In  the  figure  hanging  there 
so  patiently  and  tenderly  he  sees  for  the  first  time 
the  wonderful  vision  of  the  sweetheart  wife,  not  lost, 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 

but  enveloped  in  the  mystery  of  motherhood;  he 
hears  in  the  crooning  voice  a  tone  he  never  before 
knew.  Mother  and  child  are  united  in  mysterious 
converse.  Where  did  that  girl  whom  he  thought  so 
unsophisticated  of  the  world  learn  that  marvel  of  ac- 
quaintance with  that  babe,  so  far  removed  from  his 
ability  to  reach?  It  must  be  that  while  he  knew  the 
world,  she  understood  the  secret  of  heaven.  She  is 
so  patient.  What  a  brute  he  is  to  grow  impatient, 
when  she  endures  day  and  night  in  rapt  patience 
and  the  joy  of  content  1  She  can  enter  a  world  from 
which  he  is  barred.  And,  that  is  his  wife!  That 
was  his  sweetheart,  and  is  now — ah,  what  is  she? 
He  feels  somehow  abashed;  he  knows  that  if  he  were 
ten  times  better  than  he  is  he  might  still  feel  un- 
worthy to  touch  the  latchet  of  her  shoes;  he  feels 
that  reverence  and  awe  have  enveloped  her,  and  that 
the  first  happy  love  and  longing  are  springing  afresh 
in  his  heart.  It  is  his  wife  and  his  child;  apart  from 
him  unless  he  can  note  and  understand  that  miracle 
of  nature's  secret.  Can  he?  Well,  he  will  try — oh, 
what  a  brute!  And  he  watches  the  bending  figure, 
he  hears  the  blending  of  soft  crooning  and  retreat- 
ing sobs — and,  listening,  he  is  lost  in  the  wonder  and 
falls  under  the  spell  asleep. 

Mrs.  Y.,  you  are  happy  henceforth,  if  you  will  dis- 
regard certain  small  matters,  such  as  whether  chairs 
or  hat-racks  are  for  hats,  or  whether  the  marble  man- 
telpiece or  the  floor  is  intended  for  polishing  boot 
heels. 


Of  course,  such  an  incident  as  has  been  suggested 
is  but  one  of  thousands  of  golden  moments  when  to 
the  husband  comes  the  sudden  dazzling  recognition 


HEROINES 


of  the  mergence  of  that  half- sweetheart,  half-mis- 
tress, he  has  admired  and  a  little  tired  of,  into  the 
reverential  glory  and  loveliness  of  wifehood,  mother- 
hood, companionhood,  through  all  life  and  on 
through  the  eternity  of  inheritance  they  shall  leave 
to  Jacks  and  Jills  and  their  little  sisters  and  brothers. 
In  that  lies  the  priceless  secret  of  Christianity  and 
its  influence.  The  unspeakably  immoral  Greeks 
reared  a  temple  to  Pity;  the  grossest  mythologies 
of  Babylon,  Greece,  Rome  and  Carthage  could  not 
change  human  nature.  There  have  been  always  per- 
sons whose  temperament  made  them  sympathize 
with  grief  and  pity  the  suffering;  who,  caring  none 
for  wealth,  had  no  desire  to  steal;  who  purchased  a 
little  pleasure  for  vanity  in  the  thanks  received  for 
kindness  given.  But  Christianity  saw  the  jewel  un- 
derneath the  passing  emotion  and  gave  it  value  by 
cleansing  and  cutting  it.  In  lust-love  is  the  in- 
stinctive secret  of  the  preservation  of  the  race;  but 
the  race  is  not  worth  preserving  that  it  may  be  pre- 
served only  for  lust.  Upon  that  animal  foundation 
is  to  be  built  the  radiant  home  of  confident,  endur- 
ing and  exchanging  love  in  which  all  the  senses, 
tastes,  hopes,  aspirations  and  delights  of  friendship, 
companionship  and  human  society  shall  find  hospi- 
tality and  comfort.  When  it  has  been  achieved  it  is 
beautiful,  a  twin  to  the  delicate  rose  that  lies  in  its 
own  delicious  fragrance,  happy  on  the  pure  bosom 
of  a  lovely  girl — the  rose  that  is  finest  and  most  ex- 
quisite because  it  has  sprung  from  the  horrid  heat 
of  the  compost;  but  who  shall  think  of  the  one  in 
the  presence  of  the  pure  beauty  of  the  other? 

Nature  and  art  are  entirely  unlike  each  other, 
though  the  one  simulates  the  other.  The  art  of 
beauty  in  writing,  said  Balzac,  is  to  be  able  to  con- 

105 


THE    DELICIOUS    VICE 

struct  a  palace  upon  the  point  of  a  needle;  the  art  of 
beauty  in  living  and  loving  is  to  build  all  the  beauty 
of  social  life  and  aspiration  upon  the  sordid  yet  solid 
and  persisting  instincts  of  savagery  that  lie  deep  at 
the  bottom  of  our  gross  natures. 


Now,  it  is  in  this  tender  sacred  atmosphere,  such 
as  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Youngwed  always  pass  through,  that 
the  man  worthy  of  a  woman's  confidence  finds  the 
radiant  ideal  of  his  heroine.  He  may  with  propriety 
speak  of  these  transfigured  personalities  to  his  inti- 
mates or  write  of  them  with  kindly  pleasantry  and 
suggestion  as,  perhaps,  this  will  be  considered.  But, 
there  is  a  monitor  within  that  restrains  him  from 
analyzing  and  describing  and  dragging  into  the  glare 
of  publicity  the  sacred  details  that  give  to  life  all  its 
secret  happiness,  faith  and  delight.  To  do  so  would 
be  ten  times  worse  offense  against  the  ethics  of  un- 
written and  unspoken  things  than  describing  with 
pitiless  precision  the  death  beds  of  children,  as  Lit- 
tle Nell,  Paul  Dombey,  Dora,  Little  Eva,  and,  thank 
heaven  I  only  a  few  others. 

How  can  anybody  bear  to  read  such  pages  with- 
out feeling  that  he  is  an  intruder  where  angels  should 
veil   their   faces   as   they   await   the   transformation? 

"It  is  not  permitted  to  do  evil,"  says  the  philoso- 
pher, "that  good  may  result." 

There  are  some  things  that  should  remain  un- 
spoken and  undescribed.  Have  you  never  listened 
to  some  great  brute  of  a  sincere  preacher  of  the  gos- 
pel, as  he  warned  his  congregation  against  the  terrible 
dangers  attending  the  omission  of  purely  theo- 
logical rites  upon  infants?  Have  you  thought  of  the 
mothers    of    those    children,    listening,    whose    little 

106 


HEROINES 


ones  were  sick  or  delicate,  and  who  felt  each  word 
of  that  hard,  ominous  warning  as  an  agonizing  ter- 
ror? And  haven't  you  wanted  to  kick  the  minister 
out  of  the  pulpit,  through  the  reredos  and  into  the 
middle  of  next  week?  How  can  anybody  harrow  up 
such  tender  feelings?  How  can  anybody  like  to  be- 
lieve that  a  little  child  will  be  held  to  account? 
Many  of  us  do  so  believe,  perhaps,  whether  or  no; 
but  is  it  not  cruel  to  shake  the  rod  of  terror  over  us 
in  public?  "Suffer  little  children  to  come  unto  Me," 
said  the  Master;  He  did  not  instruct  us  to  drive  them 
with  fear  and  terror  and  trembling.  Whenever  I 
have  heard  such  sermons  I  have  wanted  to  get  up 
and  stalk  out  of  the  church  with  ostentatiousness  of 
contempt,  as  if  to  say  to  the  preacher  that  his  con- 
duct did — not — meet — with — my — approval.  But  I 
didn't;  the  philosopher  has  his  cowardice  not  less 
than  the  preacher. 


But  there  is  something  meretricious  and  cheap  in 
the  use  of  material  and  subjects  that  lie  warm  against 
the  very  secret  heart  of  nature.  The  mystery  of 
love  and  the  sanctity  of  death  are  to  be  used  by 
writers  and  artists  only  in  their  ennobling  aspect  of 
results.  A  certain  class  of  French  writers  have 
sickened  the  world  by  invading  the  sacredness  of 
passion  and  giving  prostitution  the  semblance  of 
self-abnegated  love;  a  certain  class  of  English  and 
American  writers  have  purchased  popularity  by  the 
meretricious  parade  of  the  scenes  of  death-beds. 
Both  are  violations  of  the  ethics  of  art  as  they  are 
of  nature.  True  love  as  true  sorrow  shrinks  from 
exhibition  and  should  be  permitted  to  enjoy  the 
sacredness  of  privacy. 

107 


THE     DELICIOUS     VICE 

The  famous  women  of  the  world,  Herodias,  Semi- 
ramis,  Aspasia,  Thais,  Cleopatra,  Sapho,  Messalina, 
Marie  de  Medici,  Catherine  of  Russia,  Elizabeth  of 
England — all  of  them  have  been  immoral.  Publicity  to 
women  is  like  handling  to  peaches — the  bloom  comes 
off,  whether  or  not  any  other  harm  occurs.  In  liter- 
ature, the  great  feminine  figures,  George  Sand,  Ma- 
dame de  Sevigne,  Madame  de  Stael,  George  Eliot — 
all  were  banned  and  at  least  one — the  first — was  out 
of  the  pale.  Creative  thought  has  in  it  the  germ  of 
masculinity.  Genius  in  a  woman,  as  we  usually  de- 
scribe genius,  means  masculinity,  which,  of  all  things, 
to  real  men  is  abhorrent  in  woman.  True  genius  in 
woman  is  the  antithesis  of  the  qualities  that  make 
genius  in  man;  so  is  her  heroism,  her  beauty,  her 
virtue,  her  destiny  and  her  duty. 

Let  this  be  said — even  though  it  be  only  a  jest — 
one  of  those  smart  attempts  at  epigram,  which, 
ladies,  a  man  has  no  more  power  to  resist  than  a 
baby  to  resist  the  desire  to  improve  his  thumb  by 
sucking  it — that:  whenever  you  find  a  woman  who 
looks  real — that  is,  who  produces  upon  a  real  man  the 
impression  of  being  endowed  with  the  splendid  gifts 
for  united  and  patient  companionship  in  marriage — 
whenever  you  find  her  advocating  equal  suffrage, 
equal  rights,  equal  independence  with  men  in  all 
things,  you  may  properly  run  away.  Equality  means 
so  much,  dear  sisters.  No  man  can  be  your  equal; 
you  can  not  be  his,  without  laying  down  the  very 
jewels  of  the  womanliness  that  men  love.  Be  thank- 
ful you  have  not  this  strength  and  daring;  he  pos- 
sesses those  in  order  that  he  many  stand  between  you 
and  more  powerful  brutes.  Now,  let  us  try  for  a 
smart  epigram:    But  no!  hang  the  epigram,  let  it  go. 


HEROINES 


This,  however,  may  be  said:  That,  whenever 
you  find  a  woman  wanting  all  rights  with  man;  want- 
ing his  morals  to  be  judged  by  hers,  or  willing  to 
throw  hers  in  with  his,  or  itching  to  enter  his  em- 
ployments and  labors  and  willing  that  he  shall — of 
course — nurse  the  children  and  patch  the  small  trous- 
ers and  dresses,  depend  upon  it  that  some  weak  and 
timid  man  has  been  neglecting  the  old  manly,  sav- 
age duty  of  applying  quiet  home  murder  as  society 
approves  now  and  then. 


109 


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